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PRACTICAL 

FARMING 



A Treatise on Present 
Farming Conditions and 
How to Improve Them 

BY 

SAMUEL W. ALLERTON 

II 



RAND, McNALLY & COMPANY 
1907 



LI8HAHY of CONGRESS 
Iwu UoBles Hecelvecf 

OCl 6 130? 

Copyneht Entry 
Oct 5 /(f6 7 

CLASb A XXc, No. 
COPY D. 



Copyright, 1907, by Samuel W. AUerton 



'■'■He ivho sJioweth his neighbor 
how to better existing condi- 
tiojis is a public benefactor.'' 



Preface 



Coming from Nebraska recently, my son 
said to me, "Father, you should write a 
book on farming, for you have given me 
lessons in farming, and I raise double the 
amount of oats and corn the farmers do in 
Illinois, and my land is no better than my 
neighbors'. If 3^ou can write a book and 
show the farmers how they can improve 
their systems of farming, you will be a 
great public benefactor. While traveling 
in the Old World, particularly in India and 
China, I saw the table lands worn out and 
abandoned. Will this not happen in our 
country unless the farmers change their 
systems of farming and study how to 
improve their land ? If you could show the 
farmers how to improve their land in a 
practical way instead of making it poorer, 
wouldn't it be the best work of your life?" 

Influenced by this suggestion, I submit 
my ideas. Having lived on a farm for 
twelve years — from the time I was fourteen 
years old to the twenty-sixth year of my 
life — having plowed, mowed, cradled, and 
done every kind of work connected with a 



farm, and having owned and operated 
farms practically all my life, I feel that this 
experience gives me some knowledge of 
farming, and enables me to present some 
practical ideas to those who may be inter- 
ested in my conclusions. I notice that the 
rich farmers are the men who have systems 
and keep their land in a high state of culti- 
vation. The farmer with no system and 
land worn out is the poor farmer. 

I feel that it is the duty of every man 
who has had any experience in cultivating 
soil to give publicity to his efforts and 
progress along this line, and thus add to the 
success of the American farmer. 

It is a well-established fact that Illinois, 
as a com State, is the richest natural body 
of com land in the United States. Ohio, 
Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska, 
and Missouri constitute the com belt. 
All are great states and naturally very rich, 
productive land. We see, however, that 
the great State of Illinois averages only 
about thirty-three bushels to the acre in a 
good corn year. What does this indicate? 
That the land has not been properly culti- 
vated and kept in a suitable condition to 
raise large crops of corn. 



Every farmer knows that his land is 
steadily being reduced in fertility, and is 
wondering what can be done to restore it. 
I met some farmers last year who lived east 
of Bement, on the Wabash road, who said 
they raised only thirty bushels of com and 
oats to the acre. They raise corn one year 
and oats the next year; this they call rota- 
tion of crops, but they return nothing to 
the soil, and wonder why they can't raise 
as big crops as they used to. This is very 
rich land — no better in the State of Illinois 
— and should raise sixty bushels of oats per 
acre and eighty bushels of com per acre, 
if they would rotate their crops, keep part 
of it in grass; keep some live stock — cattle, 
sheep, or hogs — and use some phosphate. 

Samuel W. Allerton. 

Chicago, September, 1907. 



GRADUALLY KILLING THE LAND 

Every man familiar with raising com 
knows that eighty bushels per acre can be 
raised as easily as thirty bushels per acre, 
if the land is properly treated. With all 
the big crops we raise — corn, oats, wheat, 
rye, barley, and flax — under our present 
system of general fanning (there are excep- 
tions), we are reducing the production 2 
per cent yearly. Professor Hopkins of the 
University of Illinois claims that the great 
rich State of Illinois will be a desert within 
one hundred years unless we change our 
system of farming. How does he prove it? 
He has a plot of ground which he has 
planted to corn for the last twenty-eight 
years. In a few years it will be exhausted, 
and will raise neither com nor clover. He 
estimates that it will take forty-eight years 
to exhaust the soil of phosphorus. He has 
two other plots, and raises corn on one and 
oats on the other every other year. This 
is the system that most of our famiers 



lo Practical F arming 



follow — plow their oat stubble in the fall, 
plant corn the next year, and sow their 
oats on the corn stubble. 

These two strips are as fine land as there 
is in Illinois, and yet raise only thirty 
bushels of corn per acre and thirty bushels 
of oats, and lose about 2 to 3 per cent every 
year in producing a crop, and, obviously, in 
thirty years will be exhausted. He has 
other plots where he plants clover one year, 
corn the next year and oats the third year, 
and in this way raises sixty bushels per 
acre; he has still other plots where he 
plants clover, com, and oats in rotation, 
with fertilizer, and raises ninety bushels per 
acre. These facts have been demonstrated 
by the State Agricultural Society at Cham- 
paign. These being facts, has not the time 
come when the farmers of the great North- 
west should do a little thinking and study 
how to improve their land? 

In the State of Maine, where the soil is of 
a very poor quality, they raise a greater 
quantity per acre than we do in the great 
State of Illinois. These facts must cer- 
tainly convince every intelligent farmer 



Five-Field System 1 1 

that we must return something to the soil, 
and that we cannot constantly reduce it 
without serious consequences. Probably 
70 per cent of the com land in Illinois has 
been cultivated for the last thirty years in 
this way — oats one year, corn the next year, 
with really nothing returned to the soil. 
FIVE-FIELD SYSTEM 
Take the average farmer who has 160 
acres of land. He may raise about seventy 
acres of corn and seventy acres of oats. 
His gross sales will not be much over $1,200. 
He should divide his 160 acres into five 
fields of thirty acres each, allowing ten 
acres for a house, barn, and garden; keep 
100 good ewes; have sixty acres in com, 
sixty acres in grass, thirty acres in rye or 
oats; keep twenty good brood sows, raise 
100 pigs, and arrange to have the pigs come 
in the last of February or the first of March. 
In this way his land would be kept in a rich 
state and he would be sure to raise seventy- 
five bushels of corn per acre (unless he had 
an excessively dry July and August), and 
he would probably raise about thirty 
bushels of rye to the acre. 



12 Practical F arming 

It would be better to sow rye, because 
he would be sure to get a better set of clover 
than after oats. If he raised loo good mar- 
ket lambs, they would be worth $500; his 
wool should bring $150; he should raise 100 
hogs to weigh 200 pounds, worth $1,200; 
his rye crop would be worth $400 at least, 
and he should raise about 4,500 bushels of 
corn, half of which he would feed to his 
hogs and horses, leaving about 2,000 bushels 
to sell, which would yield $800 more. This 
would make his gross sales amount to $3,050, 
and his land would be growing richer every 
year instead of poorer, as it is now. His corn 
fodder, properly cared for, would be much 
better feed for his stock than hay. He 
would have sixty acres in grass, and he 
could divide off ten acres, with a temporary 
fence, for a meadow. 

CROP ROTATION 

Hon. Secretary Wilson says we can keep 
our land up by the ordinary rotation of 
crops, but Professor Hopkins says not. I 
have always been of the same opinion as 
Secretary Wilson, that we can keep our land 



Fertilizers 1 3 

up by the rotation of crops under the five- 
field system, but I have watched this rota- 
tion of crops and am now convinced Pro- 
fessor Hopkins is right. I find the straw 
gets weak and lodges easily; after a few 
years the corn is not plump, the ears are not 
sound and firm as when we use phosphate 
or potash, but with the five-field system 
and phosphate, we would restore our land 
to its natural fertility and keep it in a state 
of high cultivation. 

FERTILIZERS 

Professor Hopkins advises buying Tennes- 
see phosphate rock for fertilizer. Some of 
our farmers have used it, but can't really 
see any benefit from its use, but that is 
because they don't use it properly. It 
should be sown on the green clover or green 
weeds and plowed under or mixed with 
manure and plowed under. This affords 
acids enough to liberate the phosphate 
from the rock. Therefore, any farmer 
dividing his farm into five fields, two in 
pasture, one in rye, and two in com, 



14 Practical Farming 

utilizing all his manure with a moderate 
amount of phosphate or Tennessee rock, 
would improve his land every year, and, in 
a few years, raise more corn on sixty acres of 
land than he now raises on loo acres, and 
raise a very much larger crop of rye, oats, 
or wheat. I consider this system well 
adapted to Illinois, Iowa, Ohio, Indiana, 
Wisconsin, and Missouri. Traveling through 
the old world, China or Japan, you find 
that when they market their products 
they always take something back to fer- 
tilize their soil. Necessity has taught them 
this, and should we not begin to think of 
our situation with this fact before us — that 
Illinois raises only thirty bushels of oats and 
thirty bushels of com per acre. This is a fact 
that we cannot ignore. I know that farm- 
ers sometimes get into a rut, and it is hard 
work for them to change, but the only 
thing to do is to recognize these mistakes 
and correct them. Don't try to plant so 
many acres, but raise more corn on fewer 
acres. 



Testing Commercial Fertilizers i 5 

TESTING COMMERCIAL FERTILIZERS 

It is very simple to make a test to know 
positively the value of the different kinds 
of commercial fertilizers, by taking a strip 
of land through your field and treating it 
with fertilizer. Of course, you could take 
several strips and try the value of all 
commercial fertilizers. Naturally, there is 
a great variety of soil in the different states, ■ 
and generally the farmer knows what is the 
best crop to raise on his land, but take the 
great states I have named, and com and 
oats are the best products. Nature's law 
has arranged things so that we can keep our 
land in a state of high cultivation by the 
proper rotation of crops and applying phos- 
phate. I have one farm on which corn was 
raised on clover sod and yielded 82 bushels 
per acre. The next year this same land 
was again planted to corn and yielded only 
56 bushels to the acre. A farmer adjoining 
me, with as fine land as there is in the State 
of Illinois, has corn that will yield only 25 
bushels to the acre. He is one of the farm- 
ers with the system of oats one year, corn 



i6 Practical Farming 

the next year, and never returning any- 
thing to the soil. 

Hon. James Wilson, Secretary of Agri- 
culture, says that corn cobs are of no use 
to any man. He is generally right, but 
I disagree with him in this. The cobs and 
the stalks have as much phosphate as the 
com. Stalks and cobs should never be 
burned. As good a piece of corn as I ever 
saw was raised on land covered with cobs. 
In the old states they husband their manure 
with great care. We, in the West, burn our 
straw and stalks, and put little value on 
the manure, which is a mistake. It should 
all be saved and spread on the land and 
plowed under. 

TENNESSEE PHOSPHATE ROCK 

Professor Hopkins has great faith in 
Tennessee phosphate rock as a cheap fer- 
tilizer. I have not yet had experience 
enough to state its true value. I see the 
Agricultural College of Ohio claims that 
when it is properly mixed with manure it is 
worth $50 per ton, as it will increase a crop 
of com that much. 



Proving the Value of Fertilizers 17 



PROVING THE VALUE OF FERTILIZERS 
Take one or two barrels and saw them in 
two; get some sand; wash it and fill each 
half barrel with this sand. If mixed with 
the proper fertilizers you can grow big corn. 
This test should certainly satisfy any 
farmer of the value of commercial fer- 
tilizers, for the corn could not grow in this 
sand without fertilizers, and should con- 
vince the farmer of the importance of buy- 
ing the proper fertilizers for his soil. 

CHICAGO'S MISTAKE 
There is no doubt in my mind but what 
Chicago will realize in fifty years one great 
mistake it made. V^e should have dug a 
tunnel under the city for sewerage and 
saved the fertilizer. We would then have 
had drainage for the city, and fertilizer to 
sell to enrich farm lands. 

JAMES J. HILL 
James Hill has given the American people 
warning of over- confidence in believing that 
our land will always produce great crops 
without greater intelligence in farming. 
Hill is a thinking and an observing man. 



1 8 Practical F ar niing 

He sees the rich valley of the Red River 
gradually being reduced in fertility; that 
they now have to summer fallow their land, 
and that it takes two years to raise a crop. 
In the early history of (California they sowed 
wheat, and it would shell out and they 
would have a volunteer crop, but now the 
land has to be summer fallowed, and it 
takes two years to raise a crop. Hill sees 
the necessity of arousing the farmer to 
realize that he is gradually wearing out his 
land. It is only a question of time when 
the farmer will be asking himself, "Why 
can't I raise such crops as I used to?" 
Prof. Hopkins tells me he receives thou- 
sands of letters from farmers making this 
inquiry. His answer is, "A better system 
of farming by rotating crops and applying 
phosphate to the soil," phosphate being the 
most important element in raising a good 
crop of com, potatoes, oats, barley, and 
clover. England, France, and Germany 
buy 2,500,000 tons of phosphate yearly. 
Surely they realize its value or they would 
not continually increase their demand. 
Shall we remain dormant and allow them to 



Wilful Waste Makes Woeful Want 19 

take from us that which our lands are 
hungering for? This is a serious question 
for our farmers to consider. 

WILFUL WASTE MAKES WOEFUL WANT 

There is no city in the history of the 
world that has grown, in a short time, so 
vast in population, wealth, and importance 
as the city of Chicago ; but no city has trib- 
utary to it so many acres of productive 
land. Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, 
Nebraska, and Missouri abounded in fertile 
soil. All the fanner had to do was to 
break these rich rolling prairies and he had 
a garden of the richest soil in the world. 
Crops grew in great abundance. We can 
feed the world from these lands, and yet, 
in shipping millions of bushels of grain, we 
are gradually taking from the soil millions 
of tons of phosphate and other elements 
that made our soil so productive. No 
nation has so vastly reduced its soil. The 
inventor and the enterprising manufacturer 
have made machinery to cultivate these 
rich prairies with great economy. In fifty 
years more, however, with this continual 



20 Practical F arming 

debasing of your soil, without any thought 
of restoring it to its natural fertility, what 
will be the condition of the great Mis- 
sissippi Valley that should be the empire 
of the nation? 

Unless we study how to improve our 
lands, we will be hunting for bread to feed 
our own people. No question is of so great 
importance to the American people. How 
shall tee restore our land and maintain its 
fertility? We know it has been reduced 30 
per cent and is gradually growing less pro- 
ductive, but with the aid of scientific men 
practical farmers can restore it. How shall 
we arouse the farmer to realize the impor- 
tant position he holds, for the successful 
farmer is the basis of all our great indus- 
tries. We have fine agricultural colleges, 
and yet 90 per cent of our faiTQers cultivate 
their land as they have for the last forty 
years. We read about the poor Russians 
starving because their land is worn out. 
We think this will never happen to us, but 
if we go through the southern part of the 
State of Illinois, where they used to grow 
fine crops of wheat on the rolling prairies, 



Important Questions 21 

the land abandoned to-day and selling at 
$18 to $20 per acre, we will realize our posi- 
tion. Take Central Illinois, the richest land 
in the world, and it will not raise half a crop. 
We read about Illinois raising on an average 
only half a crop of oats, and yet the fanners 
who cultivate their land properly have fine 
crops. We ship yearly 2,500,000 tons of 
phosphate rock to the old country when 
we need it at home. How can we arouse 
the farmer to buy these fertilizers and keep 
them at home ? 

IMPORTANT QUESTIONS 

We have many great questions to solve 
in this country. The tariff question, for 
instance, which is simple within itself. If 
too high, gradually reduce it a percentage 
each year and let the manufacturer adjust 
himself to a lower tariff. 

We have men who wish to run for 
President ; clamoring for government owner- 
ship of railroads, which means a centralized 
government that will be more arbitrary 
than the Russian government. 



22 Practical F arming 

The immigration question is of great 
importance; great numbers of foreigners 
coming to our land who don't tmderstand 
the meaning of Liberty — individual rights 
with reciprocal duties. This question should 
call for the best thoughts of our people. 

THE GREATEST PROBLEM OF ALL 
Great as all these questions are, however, 
there is no question of so great importance 
to the American people as how to restore 
our land to its natural fertility and keep it 
in a state of high cultivation. 

KEEP THE LAND UP 
To be prosperous and successful, the 
farmer must study how to keep his land in 
a state of high cultivation, for if kept in 
this condition, he will raise a fairly good crop 
in a bad year. If his land is run down, of 
course he will raise a poor crop, and when 
his land gets poor, he will grow poor. 

LACK OF TILING AND CROP ROTATION 

Coming from Omaha, and riding through 

Eastern Iowa and Northern Illinois, I saw 

a beautiful cotmtry, but I know the corn 

will not average thirty bushels per acre. 



Reclaiming Land 23 

Eastern Iowa and Northern Illinois need 
tiling, but I did not see a drainage tile fac- 
tory anywhere in that district. No man 
could wish for a more beautiful country and 
richer soil. If tiled and farmed by rotation, 
all this land should raise 75 bushels of corn 
per acre. I saw no farm that seemed to be 
laid out with any regard to system of lots. 
The whole thing seems to be run on a hap- 
hazard, go-as-yoti-like-it plan. On any of 
these good 160-acre farms 30 cows could be 
kept by being soiled, as easy as 15 cows if 
pastured, as cattle running in pasture fields 
tread, out more or less grass and stomp the 
ground, which is bad for it. 

RECLAIMING LAND 
The Government is spending large 
amounts of money for irrigation. If the 
State of Iowa would pass a drainage law, 
the same as Illinois has, issue 4 per cent 
bonds which they could sell, and loan the 
money to the farmers to drain the Missouri 
bottom by making proper canals and outlets 
for the rivers, they would make more good 
acres of land than the Government will by 
spending millions of dollars for irrigation. 



24 Practical F arming 

With proper outlets for the water, the 
farmers in the Missouri bottom would soon 
pay back to the State all they had borrowed 
to carry out this system, for then they 
would possess some of the finest lands in the 
world. Necessarily, the farmers must begin 
to think, and send men to the legislature in 
their interest and in the State's best interest. 
Wouldn't it be better to let the farmers have 
their own drainage districts and do the 
work themselves, as they would probably 
do the same work at one-half the cost the 
State would do it for? 

THE FARMER IS KING 
People generally think that farming is a 
laborious occupation, but by the ingenuity 
of our machinery manufacturers, the bur- 
den of farming has been reduced so that 
very little laborious work is done on a farm. 
In fact, it is the most independent life a man 
can lead; and, with rural free delivery, 
and by taking a good newspaper, the farmer 
can know what is going on in the world. 
Life on a farm gives children a good con- 
stitution, and, with our free schools, their 
opportunities are better than those of the 



The Farmer is King 25 

boy raised in the city. So far as living is 
concerned, the fanner is 100 per cent better 
off than half the people living in cities. I 
took a friend of mine down on a farm once, 
and he remarked that he supposed he would 
not get much to eat. I said, as he was 
raised in Vermont he would probably get 
along with a rind of pork, and bread 
and milk. He replied he could get 
along if he got plenty of good bread and 
milk. We drove up to a farm house and I 
told the lady we would like some dinner. 
She said it would be ready in two hours. 
After my friend ate his dinner he com- 
menced writing, and I asked him what it 
was about. He said he was making note 
of the fact that although he had eaten at 
Delmonico's and Kinsley's, and a good 
many other places, this was the finest 
dinner he had ever eaten. There were 
thirt^^-seven different dishes on the table, 
and all raised on the farm, except the coffee, 
sugar, salt, and spices. A good garden 
every' farmer ought to have. If he would 
have a long garden, so he could cultivate it 
with a horse, and plant his vegetables in 



26 Practical Farming 

rows, he would always have the finest 
vegetables in the world, while those in the 
city are, in a measure, stale. 

CANTALOUPES 

Cantaloupes are a delicious fruit. Plant 
them in this way : Dig a small hole and put 
in some horse manure; mix in some cow 
manure, and put some dirt over it. Take 
a half-inch board and make an open frame 
six feet long and three feet wide ; take some 
cheese cloth and put it on the top to keep 
the bugs off. After the plants get well 
started, take the frames off, and if you have 
some fine animal fertilizer, sprinkle it over 
the vines. This will help them and also 
keep off the bugs. The Emerald Gem and 
Rockyford are good ; Hackensack and Osage 
are better. They grow to weigh 12 to 15 
pounds and are fine. To get them started 
early, cut a rich sod one foot square and 
put it in a small box and plant your seeds. 
If you have a cold frame put it in this; if 
not, set your box in the garret. They will 
start to grow and when the weather gets 
warm set them out and this will give you 



Dairy Cows 27 

early cantaloupes. I think any man will 
work better who has a cantaloupe for 
breakfast. All men appreciate good food 
and will respond when they realize their 
employers mean to treat them well. Every 
one likes to be considered. It costs a 
farmer but little to have a good garden, 
and it will pay him ten-fold in many ways. 

DAIRY COWS 

There is no doubt but what a farmer with 
160 to 240 acres of land in Northern Illinois 
ought to keep cows, as that is the best 
stock, if he is within a reasonable distance 
of the market for his milk; for with the 
system I have laid out, he would keep his 
land in a state of high cultivation with the 
cows. I am informed that cows kept in a 
bam and soiled in summer will give more 
milk than those running in pasture. The 
farmer should have some phosphate on 
hand to mix with his manure, as it is neces- 
sary to have some kind of acid to liberate 
the phosphate from the Tennessee Rock. 



28 Practical Farming 

STEERS 

A farmer with i6o acres of land, living a 
good distance from the market, could keep 
forty steers if he soiled them in the summer. 
A farmer keeping steers would need a bam 
forty-two feet wide and sixty feet long, 
with racks on each side of the bam to feed 
his cut com, clover hay, or oat straw, with 
a water trough on each side and a yard on 
the outside. This would give the steers a 
chance to walk in the sun, which is of great 
importance in fattening them. With a 
1 2-foot loft over his cattle shed, he could 
use this space to store his corn fodder in. 

In the summer let him mow his green 
clover and soil his cattle. On his corn 
fodder cut up, a little clover hay, and five 
ears of corn each day, his cattle would grow 
all winter. During the months of May and 
June feed them a peck of corn each day; 
then he would have a lot of fat cattle, and 
not feed over forty bushels of com to a 
steer. If his farm is rich Illinois land, he 
would probably raise eighty acres of com, 
forty acres of clover, and forty acres of rye, 



Steers 



29 



and, with the manure and a Httle commercial 
fertihzer, would keep his land up in good 
shape. 

80 acres of corn at 75 bushels 

per acre would be 6,000 bu. 

To feed cattle, horses, and hogs 

would take 3,600 bu. 

Leaving to sell 2,400 bu. 

2,400 bu. corn at $.40 per 

bushel would be $ 960 

40 steers should bring a profit of 1,600 

100 hogs should bring 1,200 

30 acres of clover seed should 

produce 270 

30 acres of rye should produce . . 360 

$4,390 
Expenses : 

Two men $720 

General expenses 200 

Grocery bill 200 

Interest on money invested 

in cattle 96 $1,216 

Leaving a net profit of $3,174 



30 Practical F arming 

As a general rule, I think a small farmer 
better keep a good flock of ewes or cows 
than to handle steers ; but if he has a fancy 
for steers and knows how to buy and care 
for them, he can make money with them. 

DRY FARMING 

To raise a crop of corn the land should be 
well cultivated before planting; it can't 
be made too fine and in too good a condition 
before planting. If the ground is properly 
prepared, a crop of corn can be raised much 
easier, and if kept mellow, a crop of corn 
can be raised without much rain. If the 
land is well pulverized before planting, and 
the corn planted in a furrow 2^ inches deep, 
it can be harrowed after it has been planted 
four or five days. This starts the weeds, 
and it can be harrowed the second time. 
This kills the weeds and keeps the land 
mellow, which should be plowed not less 
than four times. I think we all plant our 
com too thick when planted in hills. Com 
will not grow under a tree in a field ; it must 
have the sun. If planted 4I feet apart in 



Dry Farming 31 

rows, in drills, one spear every nine inches, 
the sun reaches the blossoms of the com. 
In this way we get 12,848 spears on an acre, 
while if planted in hills we get only 10,602 
spears. A spear of corn growing alongside 
of another is an enemy to it when planted 
in hills. You seldom get over three ears, 
generally two, to each hill, but when the 
spears are grown separately, you will have 
an ear on every stalk and better ears. The 
farmer will say it is more work to cultivate 
the com in drills than when planted in hills, 
but plant less acres and keep more in grass 
and raise more corn on half the land. If 
the corn is planted in a furrow 2^ inches 
deep and the harrow used at least twice 
after plowing, a crop can be raised as easily 
as if planted in hills. 

You have probably read about dry 
farming in Colorado and Western Kansas. 
The farmers plow their land as deep as 
possible, and keep the top of the soil mellow 
so as to retain the moisture, and in this way 
they raise a crop with very little rain. 



32 Practical F arming 



$ioo-ACRE LAND 

It is a common remark: "I can't afford 
to keep live stock on $ioo-acre land," but 
this is a great mistake. The farmer who 
keeps his land in corn will wear out the 
soil in a few years so he can raise only half 
a crop, and the land will grow poorer every 
year. I worked one of my farms on the 
four-field system. I had 2,000 acres of corn 
which only shelled out 62 bushels per acre. 
One piece had been in grass for three years , 
and that shelled out ninety bushels per acre ; 
so I am about convinced that I will have to 
adopt a new system — have five fields 
instead of four. Illinois as a State in a few 
years would raise more corn if it only raised 
half the acres, and kept part of the land in 
grass. This I have no doubt of. 

BEAUTIFY THE FARM 

I have always felt that if the Illinois 
faiTQers would take down their fences, set 
fruit trees on the outside lines of their 
farms, have only as many fruit trees as 
they can care for and spray properly, have 
a barn to care for their cattle, the same as 



Trees 33 

they do in Germany, and soil them, in the 
spring, IlHnois would be a picture beyond 
description, and the barns would not cost 
as much as the fences. 

TREES 

Every man should set out trees every 
year. There is always some spot, not avail- 
able for crops, on which trees can be grown. 
A catalpa tree will grow a trunk suitable to 
make a fine post in eight years, a railroad 
tie in fifteen years. Such timber will be of 
great value to future generations. The 
hard maple is one of the prettiest trees 
grown in our country, but a slow grower. 
Trees that are early to bud in the spring, 
such as peach trees, should be mulched after 
the ground has frozen in the fall so as to 
hold the frost in the ground until spring 
weather is settled ; then take the mulch off 
and good peaches can be raised in most any 
climate. Trees beautify the country and 
we all love to see them. Let everybody, 
then, plant them. 



34 Practical F arming 



THE GOOD FARMER 

Sam Jones, the great evangelist, used to 
say he could always tell a good farmer. 
If he saw him leaning on the south side of 
the barn in March waiting for the sun to get 
strong, he was sure that man would never 
raise a crop. A farmer should always be 
ahead of his work. He mmst get out early 
in the spring to get his crops in; his oats 
should be sown as soon as possible; then 
he can plow his corn, for the more he plows 
his com, if done intelligently, the more corn 
he will raise. But if he is behind in his 
work, the corn will be neglected. It is very 
important to keep the ground mellow if the 
weather is dry, for then it will stand a 
drought. If left hard, the sun cracks it, 
and it will not hold the moisture; but if 
kept mellow and in fine condition, it will 
stand a drought better, and a crop of com 
can be raised if well tended and kept in 
proper shape. Don't plow too deep the 
last time for fear of cutting off the roots. 
Every farmer should try to plow his land 
very deep every four years, so as to make a 
deep soil. In traveling through Italy, 



Tiled Land 35 



where they have very small farms and not 
much of anything to fertilize their land, 
I observed that they spade the land two 
feet deep, and thus make a deep soil. 

TILED LAND 

A hill of corn growing on top of tile will 
always be the biggest hill. Central Illinois 
is fairly well tiled, but still could be 
improved with more. When I was a boy 
an Englishman bought a farm in Ontario 
County, New York, on the banks of Lake 
Geneva, which was considered a high, dry 
farm. He hauled tile all winter to tile his 
land. The people said he was crazy, that 
his land did not need tiling; but he tiled 
it, ridges and all. In those days we were 
troubled with the weevil getting into the 
heads of wheat, but the Englishman's 
wheat was always ripe before the others, 
and he raised a fine crop. His farm gained 
such a reputation that he sold it for a 
nursery at a very high price. 

In riding from Lake Geneva, Wis., to 
Chicago, I find that one-fourth of the land 
is wet and unproductive, and not of much 



36 Practical F arming 

value. If the farmers would get together, 
hire a surveyor, find the proper outlet and 
make an open drain, they could then tile 
their land to it. It makes me sick to see 
their cows knee deep in the mud, eating 
bog grass — no nourishment. If some of the 
young men who have been raised on farms 
and educated in our free schools would take 
up this matter and get surveyors to find 
the natural outlets, they would add much 
to the value of their farms. The drainage 
law in Illinois is good, and I hope Wisconsin 
has as good a one. If not, the Legislature 
of Wisconsin should pass equally as good a 
drainage law. Experience teaches me that 
farmers cannot tile too much. To me it 
is a real pleasure to take a bad piece of land 
and make it into a garden. 

SHEEP 

For a small farmer I think sheep are the 
best stock, if he keeps the right kind and 
knows how to care for them. Good market 
lambs are in great demand and will always 
bring from 6 to 8 cents per pound, and a 
farmer should get $600 to $700 net on 100 



Weeds 3 7 

ewes. Sheep are better than cattle to keep 
the land in a state of high cultivation, as 
they keep the land free from weeds. Take 
any of our good Illinois land and divide it 
into four fields; raise 80 acres of corn, 40 
acres of clover, and 40 acres of rye, sowing 
the rye after the corn is cut up. Probably 
a farm of 100 to 160 acres would not keep 
more than 80 good ewes, but, by having a 
little fertilizer, having one-fourth of the land 
always in clover, I think the land could be 
kept up, as he would have the manure. I 
think a man working a farm on this system 
necessarily would have to buy a little com- 
mercial fertilizer — some phosphate rock or 
bone meal. 

WEEDS 

When you sow clover with your oats, rye, 
or wheat, if the land is rich and you get 
any rain in August, the weeds will start. 
They should be mowed the first of Septem- 
ber, when green, before they go to seed. 
They will rot quickly and make some fer- 
tilizer. The clover will have a chance to 
grow in September and October and make a 
good root, and will make a much better 



38 Practical F arming 

crop the next year. The bigger the clover, 
the bigger the next crop of corn will be. 

EARLY POTATOES 

To raise early potatoes, plow the ground 
in the fall. Then plow out a trench early in 
the spring and fill the trench with good 
horse manure; tread it down well, and put 
a little dirt on the manure ; plant the pota- 
toes, this and will give you early potatoes. 
You can plant this same ground in late 
potatoes, which are better for the winter. 
You can start early lettuce and radishes in a 
trench of this kind, and in this way get them 
two weeks earlier than by planting on top 
of the ground, as is usually done. 

GIVE THE CHILDREN AN INTEREST 

Many farmers think they cannot afford to 
give their children anything, but this is a 
great mistake. Give them something to be 
their own. You must do this if you want 
right-thinking boys and girls, and you will 
have more willing hands to help you get out 
of debt. I knew a farmer living in Ohio who 
gave his daughter the privilege of raising 



Give the Children an Interest 39 

chickens. She made more money in this 
way than he made on his farm, and her work 
resulted in his turning his farm into a chicken 
farm. So you see he gained by giving his 
daughter something of her own. 

Give a boy an acre of corn as his own and 
he win commence to think, read, and study 
how to raise the greatest number of bushels. 
He will find that two spears of com growing 
together are natural enemies. Let him 
plant his corn in a furrow with the spears 
twelve to fifteen inches apart; cultivate it 
on a flat surface and at least six times. In 
that way it can be kept clean. If planted 
in drills and in a furrow the dirt will natur- 
ally work all around the corn. He will see 
his father planting on top of the ground, in 
hills, with three to five spears, as a rule 
never getting more than three ears on a 
hill, generally two. The father will be 
putting the plow in deep the latter part of 
June, cutting the roots of the corn, hilling 
his corn to destroy the weeds, and the wind 
drying out the hills. He will hear his 
father complain of dry weather in July and 
August — corn firing. His father will say 



40 Practical Farming 

to his neighbor, "It is getting very dry, but 
my son has an acre of corn that does not 
fire, and it looks as if he would raise two 
bushels of com to my one." 

The neighbor will say, "I don't see how 
you keep your children at home; my boys 
seem to dislike a faiTQ, and want to go on 
the railroad." This neighbor, it seems, 
gave his son a colt, but after it grew up the 
old man sold it, and put the money in his 
own pocket. Consequently, the son natur- 
ally thinks the farm a poor place to live. 

When I was a boy and lived on a farm, I 
was considered the best boy to work in 
Yates County, New York. I had a small 
interest, and this gave me courage to work 
for something of my own. With self-denial 
I saved $3,200 and established a character 
and credit so I could borrow $5,000 on my 
name. My credit was worth as much to me 
as the $3,200 I had worked twelve years to 
save. No boy can succeed unless he can 
build up a character and credit. I have 
young men on my farm who started to 
work for me by the month and now own 160 
acres of good land. 



Clay Land 41 

CLAY LAND 
A farmer having clay soil should plant 
com only on sod. If the land is good wheat 
land, plant the corn 4^ feet apart, a spear 
for every nine inches, and then cultivate 
the wheat in the corn. This is one of the 
cheapest ways of raising wheat. You have 
summer fallowed your land all summer by 
plowing corn. In the spring sow the clover 
seed, and as soon as the land is dry enough 
so the horses will not sink into the ground, 
drag the wheat and roll it. This will help 
the wheat, as it loosens the crust formed in 
the winter. You will have a fine stand of 
clover, which will be knee high in the fall. 
Pasture it one summer, or cut and soil it, 
and put what manure you have back on the 
land. The next year it will be ready for 
another corn crop, but if the -land is weak 
and not rich soil, it should be pastured two 
years. If the land is good wheat land and 
fairly good corn land, it should be divided 
into four fields, so as to have one-fourth in 
corn and one-fourth in wheat. If good 
land, it could be worked on the three-field 
system — corn, wheat, and clover — and keep 
the land up. 



42 Practical Farming 

I once knew a lawyer who lived in Ontario 
County in the State of New York, who had 
a hard clay farm — good wheat land. He 
kept one-half in wheat, dragged his wheat 
every spring, sowed his clover seed, rolled it, 
and pastured his clover the next summer ; 
mowed part of it for hay, and kept a flock 
of sheep. His clover generally grew up in 
his wheat stubble in the fall, and he broke 
his clover sod and sowed it to wheat. In 
that way he kept one -half his land in wheat 
and one-half in clover. He always raised 
the best wheat in the country, and he was 
a lawyer at that, and they are generally 
poor farmers. Of course, a farmer culti- 
vating a wheat farm in this way should keep 
sheep. 

SYSTEM 

Generally, farmers have no system. 
They fail to lay out their land into lots so 
they can adopt a system of rotation. It is 
of great importance to know each year 
where to sow and plant corn, oats, or r3"e. 
It is very important to get a good set of 
clover. Northern Illinois raises com and 
oats, but if the land is rich, the oats will fall 



The Hog the Mortgage Payer 43 

down — and it is a gamble whether you get 
a good set of clover or not. We find by 
cultivating clover in, the same as we 
do oats, we get a better stand, as it gets a 
bigger root and lives through the hot 
weather, after the oat crop is harvested. 
But to be sure of a stand a farmer should 
raise one-half rye. If the rye is dragged in 
the spring, and the crust broken, the clover 
is sure to get a good stand. With clover 
I should always sow two quarts of timothy. 
Orchard grass is better, if you can get the 
seed. A good many of our agricultural 
societies recommend what they call a catch 
crop, such as soy beans and other crops of 
that kind, to be -sown in with your corn. 
But if you raise a crop of corn worthy of a 
good farmer, a catch crop will not amount 
to anything, for it will not grow in with big 
com. 

THE HOG THE MORTGAGE PAYER 

I have always found the hog to be the 
money maker on a farm ; but we all fear the 
cholera. My convictions are that cholera 
is produced by over-feeding of corn. 



44 Practical Farming 

Farmers should raise some barley to be 
ground, for a change of feed. To raise hogs 
with a profit you should have your sows 
pig in February. Take 1 6-foot boards and 
saw them in two ; make a coop fastened up 
tight on both ends, and have a door for the 
sow to go through. Put straw around it, or 
bank it up with dirt, so as to keep it warm. 
Have some warm slop for the sows when 
they pig, so as to make milk for the pigs. 
When young, keep them growing with slop 
of barley, oats, or rye, or some other grains, 
and, of course, in the spring it will be well 
to make a temporary fence and fence up a 
few acres of clover for them to run in. If 
fed a little grain while running in this 
clover, they would make that piece of clover 
land very rich. By having your pigs come 
in February, you are enabled to get them 
fat and sell them by December, and not be 
obliged to feed them through the winter. 
It costs money to winter pigs, although a 
little alfalfa, cured nicely, will be a great 
help in wintering your pigs or brood sows. 
They will eat it like a steer eats hay, and 



The Hog the Mortgage Payer 45 

you can winter a brood sow on alfalfa with 
very little corn. 

During all the years that I personally 
lived on a farm, we never made any money 
unless we had some pigs to sell. In Illinois, 
they are called "mortgage payers," which 
I guess is the proper name for them. The 
farmer who has some small fields to sow to 
peas, some early and some late, to turn the 
hogs into during the month of June, would 
save his com, and his hogs would make a 
great growth and make the land rich so it 
would raise a good crop of corn the next 
year. In dividing up these little fields he 
might have a temporary fence that could be 
removed. 

When my son first commenced farming, 
he said, "I see one of your drawbacks is that 
you lose your hogs with the cholera. When 
I was in France, I found the farmers who 
raised chickens made little coops and scat- 
tered the chickens over the farm so as to 
keep but few together." He thought he 
would make some hog coops similar in shape 
but larger, and scatter them over the farm 
and in this way avoid the cholera. He did 



46 Practical Farming 

this and has been very successful so far in 
raising hogs. He is now raising barley to 
grind and feed his hogs, for a change from 
too much corn. 

COUNTRY LIFE THE BEST 

People in the country think living in the 
city yields more pleasure than country life; 
but this is a mistake. Two-thirds of the 
people living in the city don't live half as 
well as those living in the country. Having 
lived on a farm for twelve years of my life, 
I know, and I am sure I had as much 
pleasure as the people in the city. Mothers 
in the country have confidence in their 
daughters and sons, and are not obliged to 
have chaperons. We enjoyed going to 
dances, parties, socials, and sleigh rides as 
well as the young people in the city. People 
think that the rich get more pleasure and 
happiness out of life than the- people in 
moderate circumstances. This is another 
mistake. The rich are not the happy people 
of the world. I don't think the richest man 
in the world gets as much pleasure out of 
life as the young man who starts out to 



Boys 47 

establish a character and a credit, marries 
some noble young woman, builds a home 
he can afford, surrounds himself with true 
friends, and lives a manly life. 

BOYS 

I say to the farmers' boys: "You are 
needed in the city, for nearly all city boys 
degenerate in the third generation. But 
never go to the city until you have accom- 
plished something at home. If you do, you 
will fail." 

A boy raised on a farm, living in the 
country, in the springtime, sees Nature 
putting forth all her energies; the trees 
blooming and blossoming to bear fruit. 
He sees in this beautiful picture a lesson, 
and begins to realize that this is the spring- 
time of his life. As time goes on, he must 
ripen to true manhood and bear fruit that 
will make a place for him in the world. So 
long as he obeys the laws of his country and 
his God, he is as good as a king. Do not 
think there is anyone better. Buckle on 
the armour and, with high ambitions, strive 
to be a man in the highest sense of true 



48 Practical F arming 

manhood. In your spare time study the 
Enghsh language and you will be fitted to 
fill any position. Do not forget that in this 
life it requires pluck, energy, self-denial, 
with industry and economy to save some- 
thing and build up a character and credit — 
that with these nothing can stop you from 
being a man among men — respected and 
honored by all. Associate with girls, as 
they have a quicker conception of right 
than boys, and will, as a rule, give you a 
higher idea of life. Avoid saloons. They 
are the great evil of our country. They 
fill our land with drunkards, destroy true 
manhood, and populate our land with 
children brought into the world by degen- 
erate parents, and raised in crime, sorrow, 
and hunger. Many a poor woman is 
beaten and disgraced by a drunken hus- 
band, who in his earlier days was filled with 
love and devotion. Never associate with 
young men who patronize saloons, for if you 
do, no one can tell how low you may 
fall. How many promising young men 
have I seen who started out, as they called 
it, to be sociable and take a drink, scorning 



Girls 



49 



the idea of being a drunkard, but in a few 
years were rolling in the ditch of degrada- 
tion — a disgrace to themselves and their 
friends. Nearly all the great men of our 
country have achieved their success by 
their own exertions. It is well to read the 
histories of the lives of successful men, but 
don't forget that you must impress people 
with your individuality, thinking for your- 
self. In the winter join a debating class, 
for this will help you to express yourself. 

In traveling abroad and seeing how they 
live in the old world, I can't help but feel 
that a child is blessed when bom in Illinois, 
and the country is better than the city. 
Think of the children bom in great cities, 
living on the sidewalks and brought up in 
sorrow, crime, and hunger. Chicago arrests 
17,000 young boys yearly, who have been 
brought up in misery and never know when 
they will get a full meal. Are not children 
blessed who are brought up in the country ? 

GIRLS 
A farmer's daughter should be loved by 
everyone, for she has it within her power 
to win everyone by making all who come to 



5© Practical Farming 

her father's house at ease. Do not com- 
plain, but reahze that occupation is happi- 
ness; raake others happy and you will 
receive your share — be the sunshine of the 
house and never say a word against anyone. 
If you feel there are people you should not 
associate with, let them go. Better spend 
your time learning to cook. Many a man 
has lost his heart eating a good dinner. Do 
not be ashamed of your position in life, for 
you are a queen. A good woman is the 
great promoter of good, and men would be 
brutes without them. The farmer who 
does not love and appreciate his wife does 
not often succeed. Girls should try to get 
a good English education. If you do not 
have a natural gift for music do not spend 
your time trying to learn to play the piano. 
It is so much precious time wasted. Do 
not mourn your fate because you are not a 
rich man's daughter, for as a rule, they are 
the most unhappy girls in the world. The 
farmer's daughter is far better off than 
hundreds of daughters bom in the city. 

I once knew a farmer's daughter who was 
the oldest girl at home. She made it 



Girls 5 1 

pleasant for everyone who came to her 
father's home; she never complained, but 
realized that she had a duty to perform, and 
was anxious to do her part in the world. 
She looked after the younger children and 
made them happy, and thereby gained 
happiness for herself. I fell in love with 
her, and if the wealth of the world had been 
offered me to forego the farmer's daughter, 
I should still have taken the daughter. 
When yoimg men call, do not be bashful, 
but make them feel at ease. A bright girl, 
though not so pretty, can always win a man 
her equal. Do not feel above the young 
men, who, although plain, are industrious 
and trying to build up a character and a 
credit. They are far above the men who 
have money and have no motive in life. 
Never marry if you are not sure you are 
loved, and that the young man has a good 
character. It is far better to be a single 
woman, for they are oft times the most 
important ones in the household. 

There should be some recreation for those 
living on a farm. The father should supply 
his wife and daughters with a horse and 



52 Practical Farming 

buggy so that they can go to town and 
associate with their neighbors. 

KEEPING BOOKS 

A farmer should always keep books to 
know just what he is doing. Take an 
inventory of everything on hand the first of 
January and put it on the left-hand page; 
under this charge all purchases of stock, 
material, wages, and other expenses during 
the year. On the right page credit all sales 
of stock, products, etc., made during the 
year. Then take an inventory of every- 
thing on hand Jan. ist, following, and place 
this on the right-hand page, under the sales. 
Foot both right and left hand pages, and 
the difference between the two footings will 
be the profits for the year. 

Start the next year's books with the 
inventory last taken, placed on the left- 
hand page, and follow same method of 
charging and crediting as before. The 
merchant who does not keep his accounts 
and sees what he is doing generally goes to 
the wall. It is such a simple thing for a 
farmer to know what he is doing. He has 



Kindness 5 3 

but a few things to inventory. By keeping 
accurate accounts he will soon discover his 
mistakes, which is a very important thing 
to know. I never knew of but one man who 
did not sometimes make a mistake. That 
was a tramp who asked for some breakfast. 
I told him if he would split some w^ood he 
should have a good breakfast. He repHed 
that would be the first mistake he ever 
made — to work. 

KINDNESS 
I learned when a boy that kindness pro- 
motes good, retaliation evil. When I was 
thirteen years old I used to drive sheep and 
lambs, cows and calves from Amenia to 
Poughkeepsie, thirty miles, which took 
two days. An old Quaker, by the name of 
Howland, had some fine cherry trees. I 
used to run up on his steps, break the small 
limbs, and steal his cherries. I was going 
home with a farmer by the name of Kline 
one day who had a boy of my age. We 
asked Mr. Kline if he thought Mr. Howland 
would give us some cherries. He said 
"yes," and he drove up to the house and 
said to Mr. Howland, "The boys would like 



54 Practical F arming 

to get some cherries." He said to come 
and get all we wanted to eat, so we climbed 
up the trees and filled our ten-cent straw 
hats with cherries. When I came down 
Mr. Howland put his hand on top of my 
head and said, "Are you not the boy who 
drives sheep and runs in and breaks the 
limbs of my cherry trees?" I said "yes," 
and expected he would cuff or scold me, but 
instead he said, "My boy, when you come 
along again, come in and get all you want, 
but do not break off the limbs and steal the 
cherries." This was a lesson to me I have 
never forgotten. I realized that his kind- 
ness had won my respect and love. Had he 
kicked me I should always have felt a spirit 
of revenge. This changed my idea of life, 
and set me thinking. Was it not better 
to do right, and make friends rather than 
enemies? I set out miles of apple trees on 
the side of the road around my farm in 
remembrance of this grand old Quaker. 

SEED 
It is just as important to have a good 
seed com as to have a good breed of cattle. 
To breed com is very simple. Take twelve 



How to Secure Seed Corn 55 

good selected ears of com; plant one row 
with the com from one ear, and the next 
row with the corn from another ear. When 
the tassels form, pull off the tassels from 
every other row, so the row from which the 
tassels have been removed will have to 
breed from the next row, and in this way 
the com does not inbreed. Do this for a 
few years, and you will have perfect corn 
for seed. 

HOW TO SECURE SEED CORN 

Pick your best ears when they are good 
roasting ears ; leave the husks on and hang 
them up where they will dry ; when planted, 
every kernel is sure to come up, and your 
corn will be earlier. This is an experiment 
I have tried, and know it is all right. 

I think it is important to change your 
oats. I find by planting oats grown in 
Northern Wisconsin that we raise a better 
crop of oats in Central Illinois. It is 
always very important to have good seed of 
all kinds, and I think it a great benefit to 
change your seeds from the North to the 
South. 



56 Practical Farming 

MANGEL-WURZELS 

I think it always pays to raise mangel- 
wurzels and have a few beets to feed chick- 
ens in February. This will increase your 
egg crop. Mangel- wurzels are fine feed for 
young growing pigs in September, October, 
and November, They will eat them with a 
relish, with a little green corn. You can 
get a big growth very cheap if the ground is 
properly prepared, but if the land is weedy, 
better leave them for the other fellow to 
raise. A few roots are always good to give 
to all kinds of live stock in the winter. 
Carrots and beets are better, but cost too 
much to raise. Mangel-wurzels grow big 
and answer the purpose and are more easily 
raised. 

OATS 

Oats in Central Illinois should be sown 
as early as possible. If the ground can be 
prepared in the fall, it would be better to 
sow them in February, the same as you sow 
clover and timothy. The oat crop is said to 
be short this year, but oats that were sown 
early are, apparently, as fine a crop as ever 
grew. In Central IllincHS, particularly, it 



How to Get Started in the Spring 57 

is very important to get your oats in early 
so they will mature before the sun gets too 
hot, and if you wish to seed after oats, if 
sown early you are more liable to get a good 
stand of timothy or clover. 

HOW TO GET STARTED IN THE SPRING 

The farmer should look over his plows 
and cultivators in January and see that 
they are all in good condition so when he 
starts in the spring he is not obliged to go 
to town and get his tools repaired. He 
should buy his groceries in February, and, 
if he raises rye or wheat, it is always well 
to sow his clover or timothy in February. 
He should always try to get his oats and corn 
in early. It is said that Illinois will raise 
only half a crop of oats this year, but the 
farmer who got his crops in the first of 
March appears to have an advantage. He 
should always try to plant part of his corn 
as early as possible, as that gives him a 
chance to cultivate his early and late corn. 
This is one of the drawbacks of most 
farmers — they never start early enough in 
the spring. The best crop of spring wheat 



58 Practical F arming 

I ever saw grow in Nebraska was sown in 
February, and the man never got a chance 
to drag it in . If the ground is in condition 
it will always be well to sow your oats the 
last of February. 

ORANGE COUNTY BUTTER 

A farmer with 1 60 acres of land and wish- 
ing to get the most out of it, should keep 40 
cows and make Orange County butter. If 
good Illinois land, he should divide it 
into four fields; he would need a bam 60 
feet long and 42 feet wide; he should build 
a cement column and have two iron rods in 
this column, then bore two holes in his 
posts and set the posts on the cement 
column and this will hold them in place; 
then make a cement floor for a foundation 
and feed the cows from the sides of the bam . 

He would probably have to have stan- 
chions for his cows, but only to keep them 
in while being milked. Give them a chance 
to walk around and lie down in comfort. 
Have a yard on the outside where the cows 
can get water and get in the sun. Orange 
County butter is made in this way: Set the 



Orange County Butter 59 

milk in pans or tin pails ; churn the milk and 
cream — one ought to have some power to 
do the churning; when the butter foi*ms, 
put butter and all in a long trough, a foot 
wide, made of good oak, and have a stream 
of good well water running through it. 
Work the butter very carefully with your 
hands so as to wash out the buttermilk. If 
worked with a ladle it will make the butter 
salvy, but if made in this way, with the 
buttermilk taken out, and with a little salt, 
the butter will keep sweet a long time, and 
will always bring the highest price. 

To keep your cows in the barn the year 
roimd, you would have to have 40 acres of 
clover fenced off. The cows would eat 15 
acres of green clover, leaving 20 acres of 
clover for hay that should be made and put 
in small cocks; get some common sheeting 
soaked in oil and put on top of the cocks; 
let the hay set a day or two before putting it 
in the bam, and in this way you will have 
fine clover hay. You would have to sow five 
acres in peas in drills about three inches 
deep. Just before the peas come up sow 
one-half bushel of oats. Drag it in on top 



6o Practical Farming 



of the peas. After you have fed your green 
clover this will make the best feed, cut 
green, for the cows; it makes the best hay 
for cows in the winter, and they will give 
more milk fed on green peas and oats than 
any other feed you can give them. You 
would have to raise five acres of sweet com 
to feed after the peas are gone. To winter 
your cows you would have to cut your corn 
stalks; after they are cut up, put them in a 
tank and pour hot water over them; put 
a little bran on top to keep the heat in, and 
you will have some warm feed for your cows 
in the morning. You will have 70 acres 
for corn, 40 acres for clover, and 40 acres 
for rye. 
40 cows, 300 lbs. of butter to one cow $2,400 

100 hogs to sell 1,200 

70 acres of corn, sell 3,000 bushels . . 1,260 
40 acres of rye, 1,200 bushels 600 



$5,460 

You should raise a few calves from your 

cows to replenish the cows that are worn 

out. When you get your brand of butter 

established, yovi vshould get 30 cents per 



Working People 6i 

pound for it, and ought to get 300 pounds 
of butter to a cow kept in this way. 

WORKING PEOPLE 

The laboring man hving in the country 
would never be poor if willing to work and 
use a little economy. His opportunities are 
so much better than those of the people 
living in the city, for the laboring man in the 
city must buy everything, while the man 
in the country can own a cow, pigs, chick- 
ens, and have a garden, which is half of his 
living. Wages are higher in the city, but 
what have the city people? They are 
obliged to rent a house which costs five 
times as much as a house in the country, and 
everything they use must be bought at 
double the price, and stale at that. Their 
chances to save up any money are very 
slim. They don't work as many hours, 
but work much harder and faster when they 
do, and when out of a job, expenses go on. 
In the country a man is never out of work. 
The laboring man in the country is always 
respected by every one and not tempted to 
spend all he gets. A girl working for a 



62 Practical Farming 

farmer's wife is always respected, which is 
far better than Hving in the city where 
people don't know their next neighbor. 
WHEAT 
The soil of the Mississippi Valley is spongy 
and the wheat is liable to freeze out when 
put in shallow; it should be drilled in deep. 
If the wheat is sowed shallow, the March 
winds dry it and blow the dirt from the 
roots and injure the wheat. Generally, we 
raise a good crop of wheat if we have a wet 
March. I know of a farmer in Nebraska 
who always raises a good crop of winter 
wheat, but he always drills it in as deeply as 
possible. He says it can be drilled in four 
inches deep and will come up all right, but 
the land should be well cultivated and pul- 
verized, and in this condition, the wheat 
can be drilled in deep. A good way to 
raise wheat is to plant corn 4^ feet apart in 
drills, and drill wheat in the com not later 
than the 15th of September. 

HOW TO THRIVE ON FORTY ACRES 

OF LAND 
Forty acres of good, well tiled land, with 
a comfortable house, a good horse bani for 



How to Thrive on 40 Acres of Land 63 

three horses, a cow bam 30 by 30 feet, with 
a 15-foot loft to store com fodder in, ten 
cows, ten brood sows, all other necessary 
stock, tools, etc., ought to be bought for 
$10,000. The cow bam should have a 
cement floor. Buy one carload of bone 
meal as a starter. Two acres for a house 
and bam and two acres for a garden leaves 
thirty-six acres to be divided into four 
plots. Raise sixteen acres of corn, planted 
in drills 4^ feet apart, and drop a kernel 
every nine inches. Have two acres in 
drilled com to cut to feed the cows in 
August and September. Nine acres of the 
corn would have to be seeded with clover 
and timothy the last plowing, and fence off 
five acres of clover temporarily for a hog 
pasture. This would leave four acres to 
mow and soil cows on in the summer. 
Cows can be kept in a barn in the summer 
as well as winter with a small yard on the 
outside. Buy an old straw stack for bed- 
ding for the cows and about ten tons of 
phosphate rock to mix with the manure or 
put in the cow barn. With this you would 
make manure enough to cover ten acres 



64 Practical Farming 

each year. The five acres of clover pasture 
with the hogs would be very rich. In this 
way you would manure one-third of the 
land every year. Sixteen acres should 
raise 1,600 bushels to feed the hogs, horses, 
and cows; seven acres in cabbage, two 
acres in mangel-wurzel beets, to feed to 
young hogs in September and October and 
have some for the hogs in the winter. 

10 cows should produce $ 600 

50 hogs should produce 500 

7 acres of cabbage 1,050 

Chickens 200 

$2,350 

Labor . $400 

20 tons phosphate rock 120 

Family expenses 830 1,350 

Leaving a net profit of $1,000 

The farmer would not be as rich as 
Rockefeller and could not play golf. He 
would get his exercise in his corn fields 
and on his farm, but he would be a rich 
man compared with the average of mankind, 
and he would be independent. If he had 



How to Thrive on 40 Acres of Land 65 

a good garden, he would live as well as any 
man. He would have to work, but occupa- 
tion is happiness. It would be 320 rods 
around his 40 acres, but he would need no 
fences. He could plant 250 sour cherry 
trees, and if well sprayed and cared for, 
they should produce $400 in a few years. 
He ought to raise ten tons of cabbage on an 
acre, and it is always worth $15 per ton. 
If he knew how to make sour krout, he 
could get $300 per acre. The smart man 
might say, "Why not plant it all to cab- 
bage?" But in that way he would soon raise 
very poor cabbage and have no manure to 
mix with his fertilizer and keep his land 
rich. He should have ten coops for his 
hogs and always have the pigs come in not 
later than the first of March and have 
plenty of soft coal on hand for them to eat. 

SOFT COAL FOR HOGS 

The object of feeding soft coal to hogs is 
to keep them in a healthy condition and 
free from worms. Hogs will eat common 
screenings if you put a little salt on them. 
The sulphur in the coal is what helps the 



66 Practical F arming 

hogs. My son fed T05 tons of soft coal to 
his hogs last winter and they were always 
healthy. Soft coal is a cheap preventative 
of diseases. 

He should feed the pigs a little slop so 
after three weeks they would learn to eat, 
and the hogs would be ready to sell in 
December. He might be a little short of 
hay for his horses, but if he is a hustler, 
he could get hay on shares from some of his 
neighbors. The sixteen acres of corn cut 
up with a corn cutter would winter his cows. 

HOW TO GET A START 
The young man says, "This is all right 
for the man who has his own farm, but what 
am I to do ? I have nothing but my hands 
and good health." I will tell you. Hire 
out to some farmer, by the year, for $250 
and board; save $200 of it and deposit it in 
a good bank until you can invest it safely. 
Keep on until you have $1,500 saved, and 
then rent a farm. You would then have 
a character and credit, and wotdd have no 
trouble in renting a farm. With good 
health, nothing could prevent you from 
owning a farm. Get married when you 
have enough to start in life with. 



How I Got Started in the World 67 



HOW I GOT STARTED IN THE WORLD 

In 1849, when I was 21 years old, I owned 
three horses, a lumber wagon, five cows, 
eighty sheep, and ten brood sows. I 
rented a farm comprising 120 acres, 20 
acres in timber and 20 acres in stumps and 
stone, but very good pasture land, which 
left 80 acres of plow land. I took posses- 
sion of this farm in February. The manure 
had not been hauled out of this farm for 
four or five years, so I hauled it out the last 
of February and first of March. I raised 
40 acres of com, 20 acres of barley, 10 
acres of oats, and 10 acres of clover, and 
kept 80 sheep. I sowed my barley and 
oats the last of March and broke 20 acres of 
my sod for corn. We did not have very 
good tools in those days, but I cultivated 
this land well and furrowed it out with a 
one-horse cast iron plow, 3 J feet apart each 
way. 1 had an Irish boy working for me 
at $9 per month and hired a boy at 25 
cents per day to drop the corn. I soaked 
the corn every night in warm water; took 
some tar and boiling water; coated the 
com with a little tar rolled in plaster and 



68 Practical Farming 

set it back on the stove to sprout; while 

the boys were planting one 20 acres, I 

broke the other 20 acres, and was all 

through planting before my neighbors got 

started. 

40 acres corn, 50 bu. to the acre, 

2,000 bu $1,300 

20 acres barley, 40 bu. per acre, 

800 bu. at 60 cents 480 

Sold 40 stock hogs 240 

Sold 15 steers at Christmas at $100 

per head 1,500 

Sold products of 80 sheep 240 



$3,760 
Bought 15 steers at $60 apiece, 
got them home the first of 
Oct., fed them pumpkins, 
topped my com, and fed them 
green com through October. . .$900 
Fed them 400 bu. corn through 

November and December 260 

Rent 260 

One hired man for 9 mos., at 

$10 per mo 90 

Extra help 60 

Household expenses 150 

1,720 

Profit ... $2,040 



The Farmer's Political Duties 69 

THE FARMER'S POLITICAL DUTIES 
I have always believed that the success 
of this great Republic depends largely upon 
the intelligence of the American farmer, as 
great cities become more or less demoralized, 
and are always scheming to obtain some- 
thing for nothing, advocating socialism, 
and Municipal and Government Ownership, 
which would concentrate the powers of the 
Government. The party in power would 
always remain in power; the people would 
lose the benefit of the elective franchise, 
and thus destroy the principles this Govern- 
ment was founded on, viz.: Individual 
rights with reciprocal duties. In fact, we 
would soon be a Government as arbitrary 
as the Russian Government. The man in 
power would wield so great an influence 
that he could not be removed. With 
Municipal Ownership of street railroads, 
waterworks, and gas plants the employees 
would all have to be politicians. They 
would control a power greater than money. 
They, of course, all have friends, and when 
we have an election they would say, "If 
we don't elect the party in power we will 



70 Practical Farming 



lose our jobs," and in this way they would 
control every election. The same with 
Government Ownership. An ambitious 
President of the United States would have 
the power to renominate himself. As it is 
to-day, he may not be elected; but give 
him control of all the railroads and he 
would elect himself. 

We better stand by the principles our 
forefathers laid down: "Give every man 
a chance to do something," to build up 
some industry, something that would bene- 
fit mankind, instead of making every man 
subject to the dictation of someone in 
power. I fully realize the danger of con- 
centrating the powers of this great free 
country into a few men's hands, and I 
believe every man who loves the principles 
of our country has a duty to do in trying 
to prevent this. Abraham Lincoln said our 
Government is "a Government of the people, 
by the people, and for the people." If we 
had Government Ownership and Municipal 
Ownership, the party in power would 
remain in power. Would it then be a 
Government of the people, by the people, 



The Farmer's Political Duties 71 

and for the people? Would it not become 
an arbitrary Government controlled by a 
few who are in power? I think it is wise 
to shun political parties who advocate 
Government Ownership and Municipal 
control, if we wish to have a free Govern- 
ment controlled by the people. 

I think the farmers should take a great 
interest in politics. The politician who 
tries to divide our people into classes by 
appealing to prejudices and jealousies is a 
dangerous man. I have heard men say 
that a national debt is a national blessing. 
But a nation in debt is not different from a 
farmer in debt, for the debt must be paid. 
In the old world at least one-half the peo- 
ple's earnings or income must go to the 
Government; consequently, it is hard for a 
young man to get started in life in his own 
country. The bright ones generally come 
to our country. We now have politicians 
clamoring for Government Ownership and 
Government control. What will the result 
be? A great national debt will be piled up. 
As an illustration, think what it costs the 
Government to do any public work. The 



72 Practical Farming 

Government has been fifteen years digging 
the Hennepin Canal, which is only ninety 
miles long and sixty feet wide — and no boat 
can draw over four feet — and is costing 
millions of dollars. 

The farmers of Henry County are digging 
a ditch 2 2 miles long, loo feet wide, and ii 
feet deep for $400,000. They could have 
dug the Hennepin Canal in two years for 
one-fourth the amount it will cost the 
Government to do the work. Politicians 
are circulating a petition to get Congress to 
appropriate money to build a ship canal 
down the Illinois River, which would fill up 
with sand every spring and be another 
Hennepin Canal, and practically of no use 
to anyone. 

Canals are obsolete. Every intelligent 
man knows that a double-track electric 
freight railroad, to run at the rate of twenty 
miles per hour, would haul the products 
from Chicago to New Orleans for less than it 
would cost to tow a barge up the river 
against the current. A double-track elec- 
tric road would not cost one-tenth as much 
as a ship canal, and this would be business 



The Farmer's Political Duties 73 

— not sentiment. When they had the ship 
canal completed, costing untold millions, 
with its locks and water-power, people 
would want bread. The locks would pro- 
hibit the reclaiming of millions of acres of 
the richest land in the world. These locks 
would have to come out. 

A great national debt means taxation. 
Government Ownership and Government 
control means that the individual energy of 
the nation will be broken. We would be 
retrograding — would be a nation of tax- 
payers controlled by Government officials, 
and our individual independence would be 
destroyed. 

The great men of our nation have been 
running our Government on sentiment for 
the last ten years. Out of sentiment we 
commenced war with Spain to defend 
Cuba. We spent millions and sacrificed the 
lives of our soldiers, and, through sentiment, 
said to Cuba, "You may have your inde- 
pendence." An English statesman would 
have said, "You may get under the old flag 
and be one of us, but if you wish to be an 
independent nation, you must give us 



74 Practical F arming 

bonds for what we have spent in defending 
you." We should possess Cuba for a 
national defense, but can we afford to spend 
millions to protect it when it is of no use to 
tis during a war ? We bought the Philippine 
Islands, and are now spending $50,000,000 
to educate its people, some of whom have 
twenty wives, which means a good many 
children for us to educate. We did not 
need the Philippine Islands — far better 
for us to take care of our own people. In 
our large cities no less than 100,000 boys 
(brought into the world by degenerate 
parents, and raised in crime, sorrow, and 
hunger) are arrested yearly — and we send 
them to reformatory prisons to be pushed 
on downward. Is it any wonder that our 
land is filled with criminals? 

We are spending millions to build the 
Panama Canal. It will probably take forty 
years to build it, and it will cost one thou- 
sand millions of dollars. This is being done 
by public sentiment — not good judgment. 
We could build good docks on each side, 
with proper facilities for loading, unloading, 
and transporting the products across the 



Select Yonr Representatives Carefully 75 

isthmus, for one-tenth of what it will cost 
with a lock canal. 

We may stand it now that we are young 
and rich, but future generations will have 
to pay the debt. If we continue to run the 
nation on sentiment, we will burden our- 
selves with such a national debt that a 
farmer will not be able to buy a plow with- 
out having the Government stamp on it, 
and we will have a nation filled with Govern- 
ment officials to collect taxes. 

SELECT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES 
CAREFULLY 

Every man who loves the success of this 
great Republic — a land of equal rights to all 
— must see that professional politicians are 
not the right men to administer the affairs 
of this nation. The judges who have 
served the people faithfully for fifteen to 
twenty years are the ones who should be 
honored by being sent to the Senate and the 
House of Representatives. 



76 Practical Farming 



CORN BREAD 

One cup and a half of white commeal; 
a pinch of salt, and butter the size of a 
large walnut; pour on boiling water, and 
stir until you have a thick batter ; then drop 
in the yolks of three eggs and the beaten 
whites; add a teaspoonful of baking pow- 
der. Bake three-quarters of an hour. 



ILLINOIS SOILS IN RELATION TO SYSTEMS 
OF PERMANENT AGRICULTURE 

BY CYRIL G. HOPKINS 



UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 

Agricultural Experiment Station 



URBANA. FEBRUARY, 1907 
CIRCULAR NO. io8 



ILLINOIS SOILS IN RELATION TO SYSTEMS 
OF PERMANENT AGRICULTURE * 

BY CYRIL G. HOPKINS 

To permanently maintain profitable systems of 
agriculture is our most important material problem, 
not only in Illinois, but in the United States of 
America. It is necessary that agriculture as an 
industry shall be self-supporting, and agriculture 
must in large measure support our other important 
industries. Every form of agriculture rests pri- 
marily upon the fertility of the soil, whether it be 
grain farming, fruit growing, dairying, or live-stock 
husbandry. 

Some small countries can derive their support 
largely by conducting commerce and manufacture 
for other countries, being enabled from the profits 
of their enterprise to purchase food and other 

* An address read before the Illinois State Farmers' Institute at 
Quincy, February 20, 1907. 



8o Practical Farming 

necessities from their colonies or from other agri- 
cultural countries; and some forms of intensive 
agriculture, as market gardening, can be supported 
in restricted areas by the waste fertilizing materials 
from nearby cities, but we may well remind our- 
selves that the American Nation and the general 
agriculture of America must be self-supporting; 
for we can never hope to draw upon our colonies, 
nor upon other countries for our support. 

If we succeed in Illinois in discovering, and in 
demonstrating, and in practicing, permanent sys- 
tems of profitable agriculture, this State will be the 
first example in the history of the world to adopt 
agricultural methods that will maintain the fertility 
of the soil without the purchase of food and ferti- 
lizer from foreign countries. 

Rapid Land Ruin 
Among all the nations of the earth the United 
States stands first in rapidity of soil exhaustion. 
The improvement of seed, the use of tile drainage, 
the invention and immediate adoption of labor- 
saving agricultural machinery, the wonderful 
development of cheap and rapid means of trans- 
portation, and the opening of the world's markets 
to the American farmer, have all combined to 
make possible and to encourage the rapid depletion 
of American soils, until agricultural ruin already 
exists, practically, over vast areas in the older 
parts of this new country, the United States of 
America, while it is common knowledge that even 



Rapid Land Ruin 



in this new rich State of Illinois the lands that have 
been under cultivation for half or three-quarters of 
a century are much less productive now than they 
once were. 

In our prosperity and abundance we almost for- 
get the present famine in Russia;* can scarcely 
realize that much of the time more people are hun- 
gry in India than live in the United States; and 
will not remember to-morrow the call of to-day from 
President Roosevelt and from our state governors 
for help to relieve the widespread famine and actual 
starvation now existing in China. Meanwhile, 
shall we go on, as a people, ignorantly, carelessly, 
or wantonly robbing our soil of its fertility and 
American posterity and our children of a rightful 
heritage ? 

The almost universal practice of the civilized 
world to this date has been to ruin land, and then 
to seek out newer lands on which to repeat the proc- 

* Kazan, Russia, Feb. 20 — "The correspondent of the Associated 
Press has returned here after a twenty-five days' trip through Kazan, 
Saniara, and Ufa, three sample provinces of the twenty affected by the 
famine. The correspondent investigated the situation in all directions, 
travelmg 500 miles by sleigh in districts remote from railroads where the 
distress is most acute. 

"The population everywhere was found absolutely dependent on 
outside relief. The present state of affairs is characterized by slow 
starvation and extreme misery. The government's allowance of 36 
pounds of rye per person, per month, is most inadequate and this 
arnount is cut by 18 or 20 pounds by the cost of .transportation and 
milling. Men and even women between 18 and 55 are excluded from 
receiving the government ration. In the province of Ufa there is 
scarcely half the quantity of grain necessary for ordinary subsistence of 
the people, and peasants are in such weakened physical condition as the 
result of succession of bad harvests that supplementary assistance is 
necessary for thousands to make it possible for them to survive until 
spring and have strength enough to plant their new crop. The reports 
from other districts are practically the same, the burden of all being 
intense suffenng and gloomy outlook for the future." (From a dis- 
patch in the daily newspapers of February 20, 1907.) 



Practical Farming 



ess even more quickly. There is extreme poverty 
among the people of the world almost wherever 
they are dependent for support upon the agri- 
cultural resources of ordinary land that has been 
under cultivation for two centuries. 

1 repeat that, if it is possible, and if we shall suc- 
ceed in Illinois in discovering and adopting into 
general agricultural practice systems of farming 
that will restore our soils to their virgin fertility and 
permanently maintain a high productive capacity 
for these Illinois lands, it will be the first time for 
this to be accomplished anywhere in the world over 
such an area. 

If we are ever to adopt systems of soil improve- 
ment it must be done while we are prosperous. 
People living in poverty on impoverished lands 
have no money to invest in the improvement of 
their farms, no matter how great returns such in- 
vestments would promise in future years. Soils 
that have been running down for a century cannot 
be built up economically in a year, so as to pay an 
immediate profit on the improvements. 

While many Illinois farmers are already begin- 
ning to adopt methods of permanent soil improve- 
ment, by far the most common practice in the 
State, if continued, must inevitably result in land 
ruin. The only kind of soil treatment in common 
use that is even believed to benefit the soil is crop 
rotation, including an occasional clover crop. It is 
a fact, however, that crop rotation is a means of 



Rapid Land Ruin 83 



depleting the fertility of the soil, and clover used in 
this way in grain farming serves only as a most 
powerful soil stimulant, leaving the soil poorer with 
every passing rotation until crop yields become 
reduced, clover being the first crop to fail in this 
system. It is at this point in the process of soil 
depletion that land values usually begin to decrease, 
and as a rule this decrease is rapid. Under the 
successful clover system of grain farming the land- 
owner may receive one-half of a sixty-bushel crop 
of com, which at 35 cents a bushel will provide 50 
cents an acre for taxes and still leave $10 an acre, 
which is sufficient to pay five per cent interest on 
$200 land. But ten or twenty years after the 
clover system fails, the landowner may be receiving 
only one-third of thirty bushels of corn per acre, 
which with the same price and taxes would leave 
him only $3.00 an acre, or sufficient to pay five 
per cent interest on $60 land. 

There are now on file in my office at the Univer- 
sity about ten thousand letters relating to soils, 
written by Illinois farmers and landowners during 
the past six years. From this mass of corre- 
spondence alone, I feel that I know the opinion of 
the most progressive and observing farmers in 
Illinois regarding the tendency of crop yields under 
present systems of farming. The following extract 
is taken from a letter received from Plain field, 
Illinois, since the preceding paragraph was written : 

"Will County is a rich agricultural part of Illinois, 
naturally ; but fifty to sixty years of cropping, with 



84 Practical Far m i n g 

no systematic and scientific effort to keep up soil 
fertility, has resulted in a decrease in yield of crops 
from 25 to 35 per cent. If this continues another 
generation, it will be proportionately worse, and 
farms now held at $125 to $150 per acre will be 
held at $65 to $80, of necessity. " 

Plant Food in Rich Soils 

Lands that are valuable produce large crops. 
Soils that produce large crops are rich soils. Rich 
soils contain a large store of plant food. If we are 
to maintain Illinois lands in a high state of pro- 
ductiveness and at a high value, we must maintain 
in our soils a large supply of every essential element 
of plant food. 

It is worth while to remember that there are 
ten essential elements of plant food. If the 
supply of any one of these elements fails the crop 
will fail. These ten elements are carbon and oxy- 
gen, taken into the leaves of the plant from the air 
as carbon dioxid; hydrogen, a constituent of water, 
absorbed through the plant roots; nitrogen, taken 
from the soil by all plants and also secured from the 
air by legumes; potassium, phosphorus, mag- 
nesium, calcium, iron, and sulfur, all of which are 
secured only from the soil. 

The soil nitrogen is contained in the organic 
matter, or humus, and to maintain the supply of 
nitrogen we should keep the soil well stored with 
organic matter, making liberal use of clover or 
other legumes which have power to secure nitrogen 



Plant Food in Rich Soils 85 

from the inexhaustible supply in the air, the clover 
being plowed under either directly or as a farm 
manure. 

It is interesting to know that an acre of soil 
seven inches deep, if it possessed the average com- 
position of the earth's crust, would contain suffi- 
cient iron to meet the needs of one hundred bushels 
of com every year for 240,000 years, sufficient 
calcium for 61,000 years, magnesium for 7,600 
years, sulfur for 2,100 years, and potassium for 
2,400 years, but sufficient phosphorus for only 120 
years. 

These numbers are based upon the average com- 
position of the earth's crust, as estimated by Pro- 
fessor F. W. Clarke of the United States Geological 
Survey. They are certainly significant to the stu- 
dent of soil fertility, although perhaps no soil 
possesses exactly the average composition of the 
entire crust of the earth. 

It is also of interest to know that the nitrogen 
resting on an acre of the earth's surface is sufficient 
for 100 bushels of com every year for 700,000 years, 
although the nitrogen contained in the plowed soil 
of an acre is rarely sufficient for more than fifty 
such crops. 

Only two essential elements of plant food are 
becoming deficient in ordinary Illinois soils. These 
are nitrogen and phosphorus, neither of which is 
contained in the plowed soil of our commonest 
lands in larger quantity than would be required for 
maximum crops during the full time of one Hfe. 



86 Practical Farming 

There are some soils whose fertiHty can be main- 
tained at low-yielding power by crop rotation alone. 
This is on sloping land whose surface soil is washed 
away at least as rapidly as the fertility is removed 
by crops and whose subsoil is as rich or richer than 
the surface in mineral plant food. 

I have found some places where soils of this 
topography, with subsoils rich in mineral plant 
food, have been cropped for centuries with the pro- 
duction of two or three grain crops every ten or 
twelve years, the intervening years providing for 
the accumulation of nitrogen by legumes while the 
land is kept in pasture. These lands are valued at 
about $io to $20 an acre and so far as I can see 
this value can be maintained indefinitely without 
the application of farm manures or other plant food 
materials. 

But I cannot comprehend how it is possible to 
maintain the common Illinois prairie and level 
upland timber soils at their present value and pro- 
ductive power if we continue to remove from these 
lands larger amounts of phosphorus and nitrogen 
than are returned. 

During the past year I have had some very inter- 
esting correspondence with Doctor W. E. Macklin 
of Nankin, China, who has spent many years of 
his life as a student of Chinese and Japanese con- 
ditions. 

On September i, 1906, I wrote Doctor Macklin 
as follows: 



Plant Food in Rich Soils 87 

"It would also be of much interest and value to 
me to learn the conditions on approximately level 
upland plains — lands which are not subject to 
erosion by surface washing and which do not re- 
ceive deposits of soil material washed from higher 
lands. If there are such lands in China, it seems 
to me that if they have been cultivated for 
thousands of years and the crops largely removed 
they must have become exceedingly unproductive. " 

On October 6, 1906, Doctor Macklin replied as 
follows : 

"I think you have struck the problem of China — 
how to make the table and upland soils productive 

I know a place ten miles in diameter of 

such land as you mention where no one lives 

There is lots of such land in China and even in 
North Japan where I have traveled. " 

This letter from China only confirms a common 
observation in all old agricultural regions so far as 
I have seen them; namely, that without the return 
of plant food in some form the level uplands must 
ultimately become practically worthless and barren, 
while the sloping hill lands maintain a very low 
grade of permanent agriculture. 

It is certainly good farm practice, and usually the 
best farm practice, to remove the largest possible 
quantities of plant food from the soil, for the simple 
reason that large crops require large quantities of 
plant food ; but it is no less important to restore to 
the soil, when needed, even larger quantities of 
plant food than are removed — by turning under 
legume catch crops and crop residues not removed 
from the field, by returning manures produced on 



88 Practical Far m ing 

the farm, and so far as necessary by the purchase 
of commercial plant food, such as phosphorus in 
bone meal or rock phosphate, or, if needed, potas- 
sium in concentrated potassium salts. 

Effect of Crop Rotation 
Let us consider in further detail the effect of 
crop rotation on soil fertility. Suppose we. are 
practicing a four-year rotation, including com for 
two years, oats with clover seeding the third year, 
and clover for hay and seed crops the fourth year. 
Let us assume such crop yields as have been pro- 
duced and as can be produced, in normal seasons 
on the richest, best treated land, with good seed and 
good farming; namely, lOo bushels of corn per acre, 
loo bushels of oats, and four tons per acre of 
clover, including perhaps three tons in the hay crop 
and one ton in the seed crop. If we do not succeed 
in securing these yields we should at least try to 
make such yields possible and we should approach 
as near to them as we can. (On the best treated 
land at the University, 87 bushels of com per acre 
have been produced as an average of the last five 
years, and on three different soil experiment fields 
in the State we have harvested more than 90 
bushels of oats per acre.) 

Let us first consider the phosphorus required for 
this rotation. The two crops of com will each re- 
quire 23 pounds, 17 for the grain and 6 for the 
stalks; the oat crop will require 15 pounds of phos- 
phorus, about 1 1 for the grain and 4 for the straw; 



Effect of Crop Rotation 89 



and the 4-ton crop of clover will require 20 pounds 
of phosphorus. Thus we see that 81 pounds of the 
element phosphorus will be required for the rota- 
tion. If we leave the stalks on the land the re- 
quirement is reduced to 69 pounds of phosphorus, 
or to about 17 pounds a year per acre. 

Suppose the soil contains in the first seven inches 
1,200 pounds of phosphorus per acre, which is about 
the average of the principal type of soil in the IIH- 
nois com belt ; how many years would be required 
to remove this" amount from the land if it could be 
drawn upon at this rate? Only seventy years. 
On the other hand, suppose with this crop rotation, 
we can secure from the soil the equivalent of only 
I per cent of the phosphorus contained in the first 
seven inches. This would be only twelve pounds 
of phosphorus a year, which would necessarily 
reduce the crop yields much below the amounts 
suggested above, and, with the further reduction 
in the total amount of phosphorus year by year, 
the crop yields must be reduced accordingly. 

On the ordinary soils of Illinois ultimate failure 
is the only future for this system of farming, even 
if we consider the phosphorus alone; although, as 
stated above, the phosphorus may be returned in 
bone meal, in rock phosphate, or in sufficient 
amounts of farm manure. 

If we consider the element nitrogen in this sys- 
tem of farming we find that 200 bushels of com 
require about 200 pounds of nitrogen, aside from 



po Practical Farming 

that required for the stalks, and the stalks must be 
returned to the land without burning, otherwise 
the 96 pounds of nitrogen required for the two crops 
of stalks will also be removed from the land. The 
oats crop will remove 90 pounds of nitrogen, mak- 
ing 290 pounds per acre for the corn and the oats. 
The four tons of clover will contain about 160 
pounds of nitrogen and the clover roots and stubble 
about one-half as much as the tops, or 80 pounds 
per acre. If all of the nitrogen contained in the 
entire clover crop is taken from the air, the rotation 
would add only 80 pounds of nitrogen to the soil 
while the com and oats would remove 290 pounds. 

How then is it possible to maintain the supply of 
nitrogen by this rotation? It is not possible. 
Under such a rotation with all crops removed ex- 
cept the corn stalks, the supply of nitrogen grows 
less and less. "Where this rotation is successful for 
a time it is due to the fact that the soil nitrogen has 
been drawn upon year by year while the chief 
effect of the clover has been to extract phosphorus 
from the soil for its own growth and for the use of 
succeeding crops. 

There is another point to be considered in refer- 
ence to nitrogen. On land that is capable of fur- 
nishing sufficient nitrogen for even a 50-bushel crop 
of corn, the clover crop will undoubtedly draw a 
third of its nitrogen from the soil and not more than 
two-thirds from the air. Consequently, since two- 
thirds of the nitrogen in the entire plant is removed 



Effect of Crop Rotation 91 

in the tops, the roots and stubble will leave no 
more nitrogen in the soil than the plant takes from 
the soil. How then can we maintain the supply of 
nitrogen in the soil? By plowing under sufficient 
clover or by applying sufficient farm manure, or 
better, by using both of these means. 

If all the crops grown in the rotation are fed, 
including the com stalks, containing a total of 526 
pounds of nitrogen from four acres, and if three- 
fourths of this, or 395 pounds, are returned in the 
manure, we have sufficient to replace the 386 
pounds removed in the com and oats crops, and 
we may assume that the 160 pounds of nitrogen 
removed in the clover came from the air. Of 
course some additional nitrogen will be saved in 
the straw and stalks which are used directly for 
bedding and not for feed. 

How shall the grain farmer maintain the nitrogen 
in his soil? Possibly this can be done by plowing 
under everything produced except the grains and 
the clover seed, preferably only one corn crop being 
grown in the rotation. 

The problem of maintaining the nitrogen be- 
comes easier if we extend the rotation to include 
about two years of pasture, using a mixture of red 
clover, alsike, timothy, and red top instead of seed- 
ing red clover only, with the oats. In this case 
three grain crops, as corn, oats, and wheat, or com 
two years and oats one year, could be grown during 
the six-year rotation, the land being kept in mea- 
dow and pasture one-half of the time. 



92 Practical F arming 



Use of Farm Manure 

Farm manure always has been, and without 
doubt always will be, the principal material used in 
maintaining the fertility of the soil; but it is an 
unquestionable fact that the greatest source of 
loss to American agriculture to-day is in the enor- 
mous waste of farm manure. 

If com were worth $i .05 a bushel, then the aver- 
age annual value of the com crop of the United 
States for the past ten years, including 1906, would 
be equal to the average value of the total farm 
manure annually produced in this country. This 
statenient is based upon the careful estimates of the 
United States Department of Agriculture, placing 
the average annual corn crop at nearly 2\ billion 
bushels, and the average value of the manure 
annually produced by 20 million horses and mules, 
61 million cattle, 47 million hogs, and 52 million 
sheep, at more than 2^ billion dollars. 

The evidence is sufficient to fully justify the 
conclusion, and practical, observing farmers will 
agree, that at least one-third of the manure pro- 
duced is wasted on the average American farm. 
If this is true, then the total value per annum of 
all commercial fertilizers used in the United States 
(amounting to about $75,000,000) is equal to only 
one-tenth of the annual waste of farm manure. 
This is no argument against the intelligent and 
profitable use of commercial plant food by those 
who make, and save, and use, farm manure to the 



Value of Farm Manure 93 

greatest possible practicable extent, but it serves 
only to emphasize the tremendous loss to the coun- 
try from the waste that is permitted. 

The opinion is sometimes expressed that the 
manure made from the crops grown on the farm 
should be sufficient to maintain the fertility of the 
soil. I have made diligent inquiry at many far- 
mers' institutes in various parts of Illinois for men 
who own farms of 160 acres or more that have ever 
had manure applied over the entire farm made 
only from crops grown on the farm. I have found 
only one such man ; and I beheve that one-half of 
the land on 90 per cent of the farms of Illinois has 
never received a dressing of farm manure. 

Value of Farm Manure 
It is one thing to say that farm manure has a 
value, but quite another thing to say what that 
value is or to what it is due. 

The positive or intrinsic value of farm manure 
lies in the amounts of valuable plant food which it 
contains. It also possesses an important indirect 
value as a soil stimulant, due to its power as it fer- 
ments and decays, in contact with the soil, to 
liberate from the soil plant food that would not 
otherwise become available so quickly. There is 
still another distinct value in farm manure due to 
the fact that it makes the soil more porous and 
spongy and thus increases the power of the soil to 
absorb and retain moisture and to resist surface 
washing. In other words, this third value of farm 



94 Practical Farming 

manure is due to improvement in physical con- 
dition. 

The value of farm manure for its physical im- 
provement of the soil is commonly fully appre- 
ciated, and frequently overestimated, by popular 
agricultural writers, while its value for the plant 
food which it supplies and for that which it liber- 
ates from the soil is sometimes almost ignored. 

There is no good excuse for erroneous teaching 
regarding these different values because there 
exists a vast amount of positive information both 
from practical experience and from exact scientific 
investigations. 

Thus, organic matter from peat beds hauled out 
and spread on the land and incorporated with the 
soil produces no such effects on crop yields as are 
produced by good farm manure. Why? Because 
the peat does not decay readily so as to furnish 
plant food either by its own decomposition or by 
liberating it from the soil; and yet the peat has as 
great power as farm manure for physical improve- 
ment of the soil. 

Manure made from clover hay and heavy grain 
rations has much greater value than manure made 
from wheat straw. Why? Is it because they 
affect the physical conditions of the soil in dif- 
ferent ways? No. The great difference in value 
is due to the difference in plant food and in rapidity 
of decay. 

At the famous Agricultural Experiment Station 
at Rothamsted, England, on a field to which no 



Value of Farm Manure 95 

manure and no plant food have been applied, the 
average yield of wheat has been 13. i bushels per 
acre for more than half a century. Land treated 
with a heavy annual application of farm manure 
has produced 35.7 bushels of wheat per acre as an 
average of 51 years. Another field treated with 
commercial plant food without organic matter has 
produced 37.1 bushels of wheat per acre as an 
average during the same time. The latter field 
received a little less plant food than was furnished 
in the manure, thus furnishing ample proof of the 
value of plant food supplied in manure, and show- 
ing that the physical effect of the farm manure was 
by no means so important. 

Nevertheless, the physical effect should not be 
overlooked. Under certain seasonal conditions 
this physical value may be very important. Thus, 
in the very dry season of 1893 at Rothamsted the 
land fertiHzed with commercial plant food pro- 
duced only 21.7 bushels of wheat per acre, while 
the farm manure plot produced 34 . 2 bushels the 
sam.e year. 

In semi-arid regions the physical condition of 
the soil and its power to absorb and retain moisture 
may be the controlling factor in crop yields, but 
where the average annual rainfall is 28.21 inches 
(as at Rothamsted) or 37.39 inches (as in Illinois), 
with a fairly uniform distribution during the grow- 
ing season, the physical conditions of the soil in 
relation to crop yields may be compared to the 
shelter and other physical surroundings provided 



g6 Practical F arming 

for live stock. In other words, under normal con- 
ditions the controlling factor is food, for crops as 
well as for live stock. 

While manure has some value for physical im- 
provement and a larger value of its power to liber- 
ate plant food from the soil, it should be clearly 
understood and always borne in mind that the 
great value of farm manure, especially in profitable 
systems of permanent agriculture, is due to the 
plant food it contains, and that the greatest prob- 
lem in the handling of farm manure is to prevent 
the loss of plant food. 

The value of average fresh farm manure is about 
$2.25 a ton either when determined by chemical 
analysis on the basis of present market values for 
the plant food contained in the manure or when 
determined by the value of the increased crop 
yields produced when the manure is applied to the 
fields in ordinary crop rotations. 

This means that a pile of average fresh farm 
manure containing 100 tons is worth about S225. 
If exposed to leaching from heavy rains during 
only two or three months in the spring the value 
will be reduced as a rule from $225 to about $150 
by the loss of plant food without much reduction 
in total weight. Indeed, the total weight is fre- 
quently increased under such conditions because 
the rainwater that remains in the manure may be 
in greater amount than the urine that has been 
washed out. Fermentation and additional leach- 
ing during the summer may easily reduce the 
value to Sioo or less. 



Selling Fertility 97 



There are two satisfactory methods for handUng 
manure : 

One of these is to haul and spread the fresh ma- 
nure daily, or at least two or three times a week. 
For this purpose a manure spreader, or at least a 
wagon used for this work only, is very useful and 
almost necessary. 

The other method is to allow the manure to 
accumulate in the stall or covered feeding shed 
while it is constantly tramped by the animals and 
kept moist by the liquid excrement, sufficient bed- 
ding being used to absorb the excess and to keep 
the stock clean, and then to haul and spread it on 
the land when conditions permit. It should not be 
left, however, to dry out and heat and decompose 
in the stalls or sheds long after the animals have 
been turned out to pasture. 

Selling Fertility 

Every system of farming should be so planned 
as to be both profitable and permanent, which re- 
quires that the productive capacity of the land 
must be maintained. We must understand then 
what the soil contains, what materials are required 
to produce crops, in which parts of the crops these 
different materials are deposited, so as to know 
what part of the produce may be sold and what 
part should be retained on the farm; also what is 
done with these important plant food materials 
when the crops are fed to live stock. 



98 ' Practical F arming 

The older prairie and upland timber soils of 
Illinois are exceedingly rich in potassium, but 
relatively deficient in both nitrogen and phosphorus. 
In the worn hill lands nitrogen is usually more 
deficient than phosphorus, while in the average 
long-cultivated prairie soil phosphorus is more 
deficient than nitrogen. 

When grain crops are produced, as com, oats, 
and wheat, about two-thirds of the nitrogen and 
three-fourths of the phosphorus but only one-fourth 
of the potassium required for the crop are stored 
in the grain or seed; while about one-third of the 
nitrogen, one-fourth of the phosphorus, and three- 
fourths of the potassium are stored in the straw 
or stalks. 

Thus, a large crop of corn (100 bushels to the 
acre) will contain about 100 pounds of nitrogen in 
the grain and 48 pounds in the stalks; 17 pounds 
of phosphorous in the grain and 6 pounds in the 
stalks; 19 pounds of potassium in the grain and 
52 pounds in the stalks. Quite similar relations 
exist between the grain and straw of other crops. 

Now, with these facts in mind it is plain to see 
that a system of farming in which the grain is sold 
and only the stalks and straw are kept on the farm 
and returned to the soil carries oft" in the grain 
much of the nitrogen and phosphorus, in both of 
which these soils are more or less deficient and 
which should be returned to the land; while the 
potassium, of which the soil contains an inexhaus- 



Selling Fertility 99 

tible supply (enough in the first seven inches for 100 
bushels of corn per acre every year for seventeen 
centuries), is largely returned in the straw and 
stalks. 

It should be remembered that legume crops, as 
clover, cowpeas, and soy beans, are rich in both 
nitrogen and phosphorus, 3^ tons of clover hay 
containing as much phosphorus, and 40 pounds 
more nitrogen, than 100 bushels of corn. 

If the crops are fed to live stock, it is well to 
know that about one-fourth of the nitrogen and 
one-fourth of the phosphorus are retained in the 
flesh and bone of the animal, while three-fourths 
of the nitrogen and phosphorus and practically all 
of the potassium are returned in the solid and 
liquid manure. 

Thus we have another process of separation by 
which part of the needed nitrogen and phosphorus 
leaves the farm with the animals, while the potas- 
sium is again returned, even though it may not 
be needed. 

It should be a plain fact that manure made from 
animal excrements with straw or stalks for bedding 
must be deficient in nitrogen, and still more defi- 
cient in phosphorus, but rich in potassium, as com- 
pared with the requirements of the crop; and this 
is especially noteworthy when the manure is to be 
used on land already deficient in nitrogen and 
phosphorus, but well supplied with potassium. 

In the case of nitrogen the difficulty can be over- 

J , OF C 



lOo Practical Farming 

come by making a liberal use of clover or other 
legumes in the crop rotation and as catch crops, 
turning under these crops and crop residues so far 
as practicable. Legume crops may also be used 
in pastures to a considerable extent, thus securing 
nitrogen from the air to balance the deficiency in 
the manure. 

With the phosphorus, the difficulty is greater, 
because the proportion contained in the manure is 
less, and there is no such ever-present inexhaustible 
supply as in the case of nitrogen. 

Increasing the Value of Farm Manure 

It must be apparent that to increase the value 
of farm manure we should add phosphorus to it. 
Thus we can balance manure and when used on 
soils rich in potassium in rotations with nitrogen- 
fixing legume crops we can provide plant food in a 
balanced ration to meet the needs of the maximum 
crop yields. By these means we can check the 
progress of soil exhaustion and even gradually 
increase the fertility and productive capacity of 
the land. Indeed, we can thus profitably enrich 
such land even beyond its virgin fertility. 

By far the cheapest form of phosphorus is fine- 
ground raw rock phosphate. This material is but 
slightly available for the use of crops if applied to 
soils deficient in decaying organic matter; but, 
if applied in intimate connection with rotting 



Increasing the Value of Farm Manure loi 

manure, it is thus made soluble and available for 
plant growth. 

Certainly one of the most profitable, and prob- 
ably the very most profitable, method of main- 
taining the necessary supply of phosphorus in the 
soil is to put back into the manure in the form of 
fine-ground raw rock phosphate somewhat larger 
amounts of phosphorus than the animal has re- 
tained in his bones. It is well for a time at least 
to put back larger amounts than the animals retain, 
because the soils are already deficient in phosphorus 
and also because there may be some waste of ma- 
nure. 

These statements are based both upon the chemi- 
cal analysis of soils and crops and manures, and 
also upon carefully conducted field experiments 
covering many years. 

The Maryland Experiment Station furnishes 
some valuable data from probably the earliest 
systematic investigations still being continued, 
and a large amount of information is rapidly ac- 
cumulating from our more extensive work in Illi- 
nois; but the most complete experiments of long 
duration are reported by the Ohio Experiment 
Station. Where 40 pounds of fine-ground rock 
phosphate, costing about 16 cents, were added to 
each ton of manure and 8 tons of manure per acre 
were applied for a three-year rotation of com, 
wheat, and clover, the value of the increase in crop 
yields was equal to $2.66 for each ton of manure 



I02 Practical Farming 

used, in case of yard manure (which was worth 
only $1.64 per ton without the phosphate); and, 
in case of the stall manure, its value was increased 
from $2.22 a ton to $3.42 by the addition of the 
16 cents' worth of rock phosphate, these results 
being the average of nine ^'•ears' experiments on 
three different series of plots, based upon increased 
yield valued at 35 cents a bushel for com, 70 cents 
for wheat, and $6 . 00 a ton for clover hay. 

If we deduct the cost of the phosphate used, we 
still have what might be termed a net value of $2.50 
for the phosphated yard manure and $3.24 a ton 
for the phosphated stall manure. 

Of course it would be equally appropriate, and 
possibly more so, to speak of "manured phosphate " 
instead of "phosphated manure, " because the rock 
phosphate actually furnishes the needed and defi- 
cient element, phosphorus, while the manure helps 
to make it available. On this basis we may say 
that the value of 40 pounds of rock phosphate is 
increased from 16 cents to $1 .02 by mixing with a 
ton of yard manure, and from 16 cents to $1 . 20 by 
mixing with a ton of stall manure, after deducting 
the value of the untreated manure in each case. 

The most important fact to keep in mind, how- 
ever, is that both the manure and rock phosphate 
are much more valuable when used together than 
when used separately, because manure is deficient 
in phosphorus and rock phosphate does not act 
except in connection with rotting organic matter. 



Normal and Abnormal Soils 103 

As a rule it is better to use sufficient rock phosphate 
with each ton of manure so as to supply about 200 
pounds of rock phosphate per acre for each year 
in the crop rotation. (A good grade of raw rock 
phosphate costing $8 to $10 a ton delivered in Illi- 
nois contains at least 12^ per cent of the actual 
element phosphorus. It is as rich as steamed bone 
meal, twice as rich as acid phosphate, and four 
times as rich in phosphorus as ordinary "complete" 
commercial fertilizers costing $20 a ton.) 

There are two very satisfactory methods of mix- 
ing the rock phosphate with the manure. One is 
to sprinkle the phosphate over the manure from 
day to day as it is being made in the stall or covered 
shed. The other method is to fill the spreader part 
full of manure, then sprinkle phosphate over it 
sufficient for the load, finish loading with manure, 
and drive to the field and spread. 

This produces an intimate mixture and a very 
uniform distribution, and requires practically no 
extra work to get the phosphate on the land. 
Care should be taken that the manure is not too 
dry when the phosphate is sprinkled over the load, 
otherwise the dry rock dust may get into the gear- 
ing or bearings of the spreader and cause them to 
wear rapidly. 

Normal and Abnormal Soils 
There are some extraordinary or abnormal soils. 
Thus, there are soils exceedingly rich in nitrogen 
and well supplied with phosphorus, but very defi- 



I04 Practical Farming 

cient in potassium; as, for example, certain peaty 
swamp soils on which the application of potassium 
produces an increase in the corn crop usually 
amounting to more than thirty bushels per acre, 
and on which Illinois farmers are already using 
about $20,000 worth of concentrated potassium 
salts annually, and with a net profit of more than 
200 per cent. 

There are soils exceedingly rich in phosphorus 
and well supplied with potassium, but deficient 
only in the element nitrogen, and which require 
only a liberal use of legume crops to be turned 
under as green manures or returned to the soil as 
stable manure in order to render them highly pro- 
ductive and profitable soils. Abnormal soils of 
this class exist in considerable areas in the geologic 
neighborhood of phosphate regions, as in certain 
sections of Tennessee and Southern Kentucky. 
Some of these soils contain twenty times as much 
phosphorus as the average Illinois com belt soil. 

But, when we consider the ordinary, normal 
upland timber and prairie soils of Illinois, there are 
two substances always to be kept in mind, and 
always to be provided in abundance, for any and 
every system of permanent agriculture to be prac- 
ticed on these soils. These two essential substances 
are phosphorus and decaying organic matter, 
which will, of course, also supply the nitrogen. 

It is not of so great consequence by what meth- 
ods or in what forms these materials are supplied. 



Normal and Abnormal Soils lot; 



Phosphorus can be purchased in grain, or in 
other concentrated foodstuffs, to be fed with clover 
hay, it may be, and then appHed in the form of 
farm manure; or phosphorus may be appHed in 
the form of bone meal, which is also a farm product, 
or it may be obtained from the great phosphate 
mines of our southern states, as we obtain coal from 
our extensive mineral deposits. 

The decaying organic matter may be supplied 
in farm manure, or in sufficient quantities of leg- 
ume crops not harvested and removed from the 
land, but turned under as green manures, includ- 
ing the use of rotation pastures, or still better and 
more easily, and usually more profitably, by a 
combination of these methods. 

But there can be no permanent agriculture for 
these soils by any system under which the phos- 
phorus is removed and sold in grain and bone in 
larger amounts than are returned to the soil, nor 
under any system by which the organic matter of 
the soil is worn out or destroyed more rapidly than 
it is replaced. 

On the other hand, systems of permanent agri- 
culture for these soils are not only possible, but 
they are more profitable than any system under 
which the soil grows less productive. 

Let us consider some of the results already ob- 
tained on soil experiments fields in different parts 
of Illinois on a few important types of soil. 



io6 Practical Farming 

Soils Deficient in Nitrogen 

Normal soils on sloping hill lands are usually 
most deficient in the element nitrogen. They can 
be improved by growing clover or other legumes 
and turning these crops under either directly or in 
the form of manure. In some places, more especi- 
ally in Southern Illinois, these soils are more or less 
acid, and this acidity must be corrected by lime or 
ground limestone in order to grow legume crops 
successfully. 

On the Vienna soil experiment field in Johnson 
Countv, where com is grown in a three-year rota- 
tion, ii8 bushels of corn per acre have been pro- 
duced as a total for the past four years on untreated 
rotated land. The turning under of legume crops 
and catch crops without lime has produced only 
six bushels total increase. Where lime has been 
applied with this legume treatment, the produce 
has been i68 bushels in four years, a gain of 50 
bushels of corn, or i2| bushels a year. No further 
increase in com has been made as yet by phos- 
phorus or potassium. 

Four wheat crops on untreated rotated land 
(wheat being grown on the same land once in three 
years) have produced 12 bushels, averaging three 
bushels a year. Where legumes have been turned 
under the four crops of wheat amounted to 24 
bushels, and with legume-lime treatment 47 bush- 
els of wheat have been obtained, averaging 12 
bushels a year 



Soils Deficient in Nitrogen 107 

Thus, legumes without Hme increased the aver- 
age yields by 1^ bushels of corn and three bushels 
of wheat; and legumes with lime increased the 
average yields by i2|- bushels of corn and nine 
bushels of wheat. Phosphorus and potassium 
have further increased the yield of wheat, but not 
sufficiently as yet to justify their use when all crops 
grown are considered. 

Some pot culture experiments conducted with 
soil from worn sloping timber land in Henry County 
furnish results that still further emphasize the need 
of nitrogen in this class of soils. It should be 
understood that pot cultures are carried on under 
perfect control and with almost ideal conditions 
for the highest yields possible with the soil used. 

Oats were grown in these pot cultures and they 
yielded at the rate of 21 bushels per acre on un- 
treated soil. With potassium applied the rate of 
yield was 23 bushels, with phosphorus 31 bushels, 
and with nitrogen applied the rate of yield was 225 
bushels of oats per acre. 

Sand soils are also markedly deficient in nitrogen 
as a rule. On the Green Valley soil experiment 
field in Tazewell County, as an average of three 
tests each year, nitrogen produced 3 1 bushels per 
acre increase in corn in 1902 and 43 bushels increase 
in 1903; also an increase of 27 bushels of oats per 
acre in 1904 and 18 bushels of wheat per acre in 
1905 ; and in 1906 four plots not receiving nitrogen 
yielded 18 bushels, 10 bushels, 8 bushels, and 18 



io8 Practical F arming 



bushels, respectively, of com per acre, while four 
other adjoining or intermediate plots, whose treat- 
ment differed from the first four only in the appli- 
cation of nitrogen, produced, respectively, 63 
bushels, 71 bushels, 75 bushels, and 66 bushels of 
com per acre. 

(3n similar adjoining land, where nitrogen had 
been supplied only by growing and turning under 
cowpeas, four plots produced 58 bushels, 43 bush- 
els, 46 bushels, and 54 bushels of corn per acre, 
respectively. 

Soils Deficient in Potassium 

Peaty swamp lands are commonly exceedingly 
rich in nitrogen, well supplied with phosphorus, 
but very deficient in potassium. On the Momence 
soil experiment field, in Kankakee County, com 
has been grown every year for five years on one 
series of plots. Three plots in this series not treat- 
ed with potassium have produced 14.3 bushels, 
10. o bushels, and 10.6 bushels, respectively, of 
com per acre as a total for the five crops, the aver- 
age annual yield being 2 . 4 bushels per acre of com 
of very poor quality. On three adjoining plots of 
similar land, whose treatment differed only in the 
application of potassium, the total corn produced 
in the five crops is 221.9 bushels, 242.8 bushels, 
and 233.7 bushels, respectively, thus making an 
average annual yield of 46.6 bushels of com per 
acre. 



Soils Deficient in Potassium 109 

As an average of the five years at 35 cents a bush- 
el for com the average annual net value of the in- 
crease produced by potassium amounts to $12.06 
an acre after paying for the cost of the potassium 
applied. 

While peaty swamp lands are very abnormal in 
composition, they are abundant in northern Illinois, 
and their improvement with the use of potassium 
is becoming quite general. Indeed the annual prof- 
its from the use of potassium on these peaty swamp 
lands in Illinois is already known to be far above 
the total annual appropriation for the investigation 
of Illinois soils. 

But of far greater interest and importance to 
Illinois are the results obtained from the improve- 
ment of the ordinary prairie and upland timber 
soils, representing the most abundant soil types 
of the state. 

Counting 35 cents a bushel for corn, 25 cents for 
oats, 70 cents for wheat, and $6 .00 a ton for clover 
hay, for the increases produced in these crop? by 
the different elements of plant food applied, we 
may summarize in a very brief and satisfactory 
manner the results thus far secured from a suffi- 
cient number of the soil experiment fields on these 
important soil types to furnish a clear understand- 
ing and a reliable basis of opinion concerning the 
relative and actual value of these plant food ele- 
ments during the first five years. 



no Practical F arming 

Methods of Soil Investigation 

It should be understood that most of the results 
reported in this paper have been secured from 
v^hat we term "complete fertility" experiments, 
which were designed for the one purpose of securing 
information as quickly as possible concerning the 
needs of the soil. 

Thus, in order to learn quickly and certainly if 
the soil needs more nitrogen we have applied nitro- 
gen liberally in one of the best and most expensive 
forms. Other experiments are in progress to 
ascertain how rapidly and how economically we can 
secure nitrogen from the air by legumes in crop 
rotation. 

Again, in order to learn if the soil needs phos- 
phorus we have applied phosphorus in steamed 
bone meal, which is known to furnish it in a very 
good and readily available form, although at three 
times the cost of natural rock phosphate. Other 
experiments are in progress to ascertain how rapidly 
we can make rock phosphate available under 
various conditions. 

We have also applied the element potassium in 
the ordinary commercial salts, as potassium sulfate, 
and potassium chlorid, in order to learn if this ele- 
ment of plant food applied in readily available 
form will increase our crop yields. Other experi- 
ments are being carried on with the hope of ascer- 
taining the best methods of liberating sufficient 



Methods of Soil Investigation iii 

potassium from the immense supply naturally- 
contained in most soils. 

It will be understood then that while the infor- 
mation already secured, both by soil analysis and 
by pot cultures and field experiments, shows con- 
clusively that certain soils are deficient in certain 
plant food elements and that the addition of these 
elements produces large increases in crop yields, 
the investigation is by no means complete as to the 
most profitable means of supplying these different 
plant food elements in systems of permanent agri- 
culture. 

If the total supply of any element in the soil is 
limited, as is the case with nitrogen and phosphorus 
in most soils, it seems certain that no system of 
agriculture can be permanently successful unless 
we return to the soil as large or larger amounts of 
that elernent as we remove in crops. It is because 
of this apparently self-evident fact that our stan- 
dard application of phosphorus is slightly more 
than the amount removed in very large crops, so 
that under this treatment the soil must grow richer 
and richer in phosphorus. 

One other very important point should always 
be kept in mind in considering the effect of soil 
treatment on crop yields. This is the fact that the 
material in which the plant food element is applied 
may produce an indirect effect which may cause 
an increase in the crop yield not due to the element 
in mind for its own sake, but due to some stimu- 



112 Practical Farming 

lating action of the applied substance upon other 
elements already in the soil. Soluble salts, such 
as sodium nitrate, acid phosphate, and potassium 
salts, are known to produce some very marked 
indirect or stimulating effects, similar to the efifect 
of that powerful soil stimulant, landplaster. Ma- 
terials used for this purpose which do not supply 
in themselves the deficient plant food element in 
sufficient amount to fully meet the needs of the 
crop are to be used with caution and with full un- 
derstanding that they tend to make the soil poorer 
and poorer in the element liberated. Light and 
infrequent applications of farm manure and only 
occasional crops of clover act to a greater or less 
extent as soil stimulants, if they liberate plant food 
from the soil, and thus enable the crops to remove 
much larger amounts of fertility than are actually 
supplied by the manure or clover. 

In the case of nitrogen and phosphorus we have 
tried to avoid these indirect or stimulating effects 
by using dried blood and steamed bone meal in 
place of any soluble salts, as sodium nitrate and 
acid phosphate, which are very commonly used for 
such experiments; but there is no satisfactory 
insoluble readily available form of potassium, and 
consequently we could not avoid using a soluble 
potassium salt. Thus, in considering the results 
reported below, we may have confidence that the 
effects produced by nitrogen and phosphorus are 
properly to be credited to those elements for their 



Soils Deficient in Phosphorus and Nitrogen 113 

own value as plant food, but the effects on crop 
yields produced by potassium salts applied to soils 
naturally rich in that element are undoubtedly due 
in part at least to an indirect or stimulating action. 
The actual cost per acre per annum for the mater- 
ials used in these complete fertility experiments is 
about $15 for 100 pounds of nitrogen in dried blood, 
$2 . 50 for 25 pounds of phosphorus in 200 pounds of 
steamed bone meal, and $2 . 50 for 40 pounds of po- 
tassium in 100 pounds of potassium sulfate. Thus, 
for five years the cost per acre is $75 for nitrogen, 
$12.50 for phosphorus, and $12.50 for potassium. 

Soils Deficient in Phosphorus and Nitrogen 

On the Antioch soil experiment field, in Lake 
County, on timber soil, where nitrogen has been 
applied in dried blood the value of the increase in 
five years amounts to $6.04 an acre; where phos- 
phorus has been applied in steamed bone meal the 
value of the increase is $33 . 73 an acre in five years ; 
and where potassium has been used in addition to 
both nitrogen and phosphorus, under the most 
favorable condition, the value of the increase by 
potassium is $12.12. 

On the Bloomington soil experiment field, in 
McLean County, on prairie soil, the increase pro- 
duced by nitrogen alone is worth $1.77 in five 
years; where bone meal was applied the value of 
increase by phosphorus is $22.77; and where 



114 Practical Farming 

potassium was applied, under the best conditions, 
the increase in crops was worth Sio. 50. 

Of greatest interest is the increase produced on 
this typical com belt land where both nitrogen and 
phosphorus were provided. This amounted to 
$36.49 in five years. These results show that this 
soil needs both phosphorus and nitrogen, but it 
needs phosphorus first. Thus, the nitrogen with- 
out phosphorus was worth only $1.77, but in addi- 
tion to phosphorus the nitrogen was worth $13.72 
an acre in five years. On the other hand, the phos- 
phorus alone was worth $22.77; but when used 
with nitrogen the phosphorus was worth $34.72 
above what the nitrogen alone was worth. 

In a somewhat different rotation on the Sibley 
soil experiment field in Ford County, on prairie 
land, the value of increases produced in five years 
has been $2 . 45 for nitrogen, $12 . 99 for phosphorus, 
$27.47 for nitrogen and phosphorus together, and 
20 cents for potassium when applied in addition 
to nitrogen and phosphorus. 

Phosphorus and Clover 

As was anticipated when these experiments were 
begun, we are securing information more rapidly 
where we are applying nitrogen in commercial 
form at an annual cost of $ 1 5 or more per acre than 
where we depend entirely upon legume crops grown 
in the rotations. While phosphorus is usually the 
most deficient element in the prairie soils, that ele- 



Phosphorus and Clover 115 



ment cannot increase the yield more than 10 to 20 
bushels as a rule until nitrogen becomes the limit- 
ing element; and where we use phosphorus with- 
out nitrogen the nitrogen limit of yield grows lower 
and lower until ultimately it sinks below the phos- 
phorus limit, after which phosphorus has no power 
to increase the yield until the supply of nitrogen is 
increased. The very marked increase in clover 
produced by phosphorus is due to the fact that for 
this crop there is no nitrogen limit because if the 
available soil nitrogen is insufficient the clover 
plant can draw upon the atmospheric nitrogen for 
enough to balance its own ration. 

Thus, on the Blooniington field in 1906, phos- 
phorus increased the yield of clover from . 58 ton to 
1.65 tons, a gain of 1.07 tons per acre by phos- 
phorus; and, as an average of the last three years 
on the experiment field at Urbana, phosphorus has 
increased the yield of clover from .73 ton to 1.75 
tons per acre, the gain for phosphorus being more 
than one ton of clover hay per acre as an average 
of three successive years, all weights reported being 
for thoroughly air-dried hay (not merely field 
cured). 

The importance of phosphorus and clover is very 
well illustrated by considering the yields from two 
plots in the three-year rotation on the university 
field at Urbana, which differed in yielding power 
by only three bushels of com per acre as an average 
of three years previous to the beginning of treat- 



ii6 Practical F arming 

ment. One of these plots has been receiving phos- 
phorus since 1902, while the other receives no phos- 
phorus. Otherwise the two plots are treated alike', 
in every respect. 

In 1903, the yields of corn were 71 bushels and 
84 bushels, making 13 bushels in favor of the phos- 
phorus-treated plot. 

In 1904, the yields of oats were 48 and 60 bush- 
els, a gain of 12 bushels for phosphorus. 

In 1905, the yields of clover were .87 and 1.83 
tons of thoroughly air-dry hay, a gain of .96 ton, 
showing that the phosphorus more than doubled 
the yield. 

In 1906, com was again grown on these plots and 
it was to be expected that the com would be bene- 
fited, not only by the phosphorus applied, but also 
because of the larger amount of clover roots and 
residues left on the phosphorus plot. The yields 
of com in 1906 were 58 and 84 bushels, a difference 
of 26 bushels in favor of the phosphorus plot. The 
value of the increase for the four years is $22.41, 
while the phosphorus cost only $10 in steamed 
bone meal, and the same amount of phosphorus 
can be purchased in raw rock phosphate for $3. 20. 

On the Virginia soil experiment field in Cass 
County, nitrogen is already the limiting element, 
being more deficient than phosphorus. 

The value of the increase produced by nitrogen 
in five years is $6.94; that by phosphorus alone is 
only $1.78, but where nitrogen and phosphorus 



Soil Problems in Southern Illinois 117 

are applied together the increase is worth $13.89. 
Potassium produced $4 . 00 worth of increase under 
the most favorable conditions. 

It is known that the untreated check plots on the 
Virginia field were somewhat better than the other 
plots in the field when the experiments were begun. 
This has been a rather heavy handicap against the 
soil treatment, although the treated land has over- 
come this handicap and made some additional 
gains, as shown by the data given. 

If we consider nitrogen under the most favor- 
able conditions, as we have regularly done with 
potassium, we shall probably have a more trust- 
worthy opinion of its importance on the Virginia 
field. Where nitrogen has been applied in addi- 
tion to both phosphorus and potassium, the value 
of the increase by nitrogen is $31 .80 an acre from 
the five crops. 

Soil Problems in Southern Illinois 

If we turn to the experiment fields on the South- 
em Illinois prairie lands, we may summarize the 
results in a similar manner, but we shall find addi- 
tional problems peculiar to those soils, some of 
which will doubtless require much further investi- 
gation for correct and final solution. 

First of all we should emphasize the fact that the 
common soil in this great area is acid, or sour, and 
that some form of lime must be applied to the land 
in liberal amount as a part of any system of im- 



ii8 Practical Farming 

provement for this soil, especially for the benefit of 
clover and other legume crops which are so essen- 
tial in good crop rotations. 

Ground limestone promises to be both the best 
and the most economical form of lime for this pur- 
pose, and definite arrangements have already been 
made, under the direction of the Governor and the 
Board of Prison Industries, to have the State fur- 
nish this material to the farmers at cost. 

Information thus far secured indicates that finely 
ground limestone will be delivered at the railroad 
stations in Southern Illinois at a cost varying from 
$i.oo to $2.00 a ton, that two to four tons per 
acre will be sufficient for an initial application, and 
that 50 cents an acre a year should be ample to 
provide for subsequent applications sufficient to 
keep the soil sweet. 

As an average of 56 tests made during the past 
three years on crop rotations including cowpeas, 
clover, com, oats, and wheat, the average annual 
value of the increase in crop yields from the use 
of lime or limestone on these soils has been more 
than five times this estimated average annual 
expense. 

These soils are not only deficient in lime, but 
they are also very deficient in phosphorus and in 
decaying organic matter needed to make available 
for plant growth the potassium and other mineral 
elements naturally contained in the soil in very 
large quantities, also to keep the phosphorus in 



Soil Problems in Southern Illinois 119 

available combination, and ultimately, of course, 
to furnish nitrogen, which, however, at present is 
less effective when applied than either phosphorus 
or potassium, as will be seen from the data given. 

As an average of duplicate tests on the Du Bois 
field in Washington County, nitrogen alone has 
produced $2 . 19 increase in five years; the increase 
from phosphorus in bone meal has been $20.74; 
while potassium applied under the most favored 
conditions, has produced increases valued at $9 . 93. 

It is noteworthy, however, that the effect of 
potassium on certain very important crops, as 
com, clover, and cowpeas, is more marked in the 
later years; and it is becoming evident that until 
we are able to increase the supply of decaying 
organic matter in those Southern Illinois prairie 
soils, we may find some profit in using potassium, 
best supplied in kainit, perhaps, probably for its 
combined effect as plant food and as a soil stimu- 
lant, possibly serving in part to make phosphorus 
more available under the existing conditions. 

In this special connection, the results obtained 
from the use of potassium salts and of other salts 
as well in investigations extending over half a cen- 
tury at the Rothamsted Experiment Station are of 
great interest and value: 

Where wheat was grown continuously without 
organic manures, the yield was increased 5 . 6 bush- 
els per acre, as an average of the first 24 years, by 
the application of 200 pounds per annum of po- 



I20 Practical F arming 

tassium sulfate. This might seem to be conclusive 
proof of the need of potassium in the Rothamsted 
soil, but such was not indicated by the soil analysis. 
Furthermore, when, instead of the potassium sul- 
fate, an application of 280 pounds of magnesium 
sulfate was substituted, exactly the same increase 
was produced as an average of the 24-year period. 

During the second 24-year period the potassium 
salt increased the average yield by 8.8 bushels, 
while the increase by magnesium sulfate was only 
6.6 bushels. 

In the case of barley grown continuously on the 
same land for 48 years, the application of sodium 
salts without potassium produced a larger average 
increase than when potassium was included in the 
application. 

These results certainly emphasize the fact that 
the effect produced by potassium salts on lands 
rich in native potassium may be due largely at 
least to its power as a soil stimulant and that the 
same effect may be secured by applying other less 
expensive soluble salts or probably still more econo- 
mically by means of decaying organic matter, 
which, however, must be first produced before it 
can be turned under. 

On the Cutler experiment field in Perry County, 
nitrogen has produced no increase; phosphorus 
alone in bone meal has made only $4.85 in five 
years; while potassium used alone has returned 
only $1.23 in the five years. 



Soil Problems in Southern Illinois 



121 



Under the most favored conditions for each ele- 
ment in turn, nitrogen has produced no gain, phos- 
phorus a gain worth $15.54, and potassium a gain 
worth $13.82. When phosphorus and potassium 
were used together the gain was $25.56 per acre in 
five years, when appHed in bone meal and potas- 
sium sulfate. 

Some extensive experiments are in progress on 
this soil in which these elements are brought to- 
gether at much less expense, the phosphorus being 
supplied in rock phosphate and the potassium in 
smaller amount in kainit, which, however, also 
carries some other salts which may produce the 
indirect or stimulating effect. The object of this 
as of other soil investigations is to find some system 
of permanent agriculture that shall also be profit- 
able on this Southern Illinois soil, and it is to be 
hoped that the use of this soluble fertilizer and 
stimulant can soon be replaced by manure or other 
organic matter from the increased crops. 

On the regular rotation field at Cutler where 
nitrogen is secured only by growing legumes, the 
five-year increase by phosphorus and potassium 
together is $18.34, of which $9.12 were secured 
during the first three years, while $9.22 were 
secured during the last two years. 

Likewise on the Odin soil experiment field in 
Marion County, the average increase for the first 
three years does not pay for the cost of treatment, 
but the increase produced on three series of plots 



122 Practical F arming 

during the last two years on two crops of. corn, two 
of wheat, one of cowpeas, and one of clover, slightly 
more than paid the cost of the bone meal and 
potassium sulfate. 

The average yields produced on these best 
treated plots were 57 bushels of corn, 2;^ bushels 
of wheat, i . 3 tons of clover, and 2 . 4 tons of cowpea 
hay. 

On one division of the Edgewood soil experi- 
ment field in Efiftngham County, where the land 
has been tile-drained for six years, and where the 
soil has been treated with one application of ten 
tons of ground limestone and the regular amounts 
of phosphorus and potassium, the following yields 
have been secured : 

Clover, 2 . 69 tons per acre in 1904 ; 
Com, 87 bushels per acre in 1905; 
Oats, 73 bushels per acre in 1906. 

The value of the increase produced by the lime, 
phosphorus, and potassium, over the untreated 
land, is $17.96 for the last three years, averaging 
$5 . 99 per acre per annum. 

It should be understood that the present value 
of this land is at least $100 an acre less than that 
of the ordinary corn belt land; that with proper 
treatment this land should continue to improve, 
and with the crops now being produced consider- 
able manure will be made which can be returned 
to the land to further increase the crop yields and 



Permanent Agriculture on Every Farm 123 

at the same time permit some decrease in the 
purchase of commercial plant food, especially of 
potassium. 

Furthermore, it should be kept in mind that 
systems of soil improvement must be adopted 
even for the com belt land in order to maintain 
its present value and productive power. 

Time will not permit the discussion of other 
Southern Illinois problems concerning which we 
have some information and need very much more, 
including the effect and feasibility of tile drainage 
and subsoiling, the special value of farm manure on 
these lands, and the crops and crop rotations best 
adapted to the profitable improvement of Southern 
Illinois soils. 

Permanent Agriculture on Every Farm 

In conclusion, I beg to repeat a suggestion which 
I made at your annual meeting four years ago, to 
the effect that every landowner adopt a system of 
permanent soil maintenance or of soil improvement 
on at least an acre strip of land across every im- 
portant cultivated field, making his plan for this 
from his own knowledge combined with all of the 
information obtainable from the soil experiment 
fields and other soil investigations. 

Whatever treatment is decided upon should be 
applied and repeated with every rotation with any 
modifications justified by accumulated knowledge 
and results, until it is demonstrated upon the 



124 Practical Farming 

individual farm that there are systems of perma- 
nent profitable agriculture of unlimited application 
that can be practiced in Illinois. 

When making these plans for our most common 
normal prairie lands in Northern, Central, and 
Southern Illinois, it may well be kept in mind that 
our three greatest problems are : 

(i) To secure nitrogen from the inexhaustible 
supply in the air. 

(2) To liberate potassium from the practically 
inexhaustible supply in the soil. 

(3) To return phosphorus to the soil in some 
form in as large or larger amounts than are re- 
moved in crops. 



Through the courtesy of Professor Hopkins, I 
have given his experiences in scientific farming. 
Professor Hopkins is doing a great work, and 
striving to arouse the farmers to a better cultivation 
of their land, and he fully realizes the importance 
of a better system of farming. 



■i«w«r 



